News

A few weekends ago it rained all day Saturday and during a heavy rain, especially at spring time, our combined sewers which carry waste water and storm water will reach their maximum and over flow into the Red River. Our professor told us in class that the waste water and storm water mixture had over flowed for five hours during this day! I know from my environmental action that Winnipeg has 79 different spots where this can occur along the Red River! What I didn't realize when I was doing my action and thinking about the 18 average over flows a year is the length of time an overflow occurs for. Five hours is a long time and that is a lot of untreated waste and storm water going directly into the river, plus most of the chemicals, garbage, and salt that has collected over the winter. This combined sewer infrastructure that exists in the old parts of the city is so bad for the environment and I can only image the "damage" that occurs when it rains for days straight! Because we cannot destroy our city to build new waste water infrastructure we must develop new technologies and better practices. Some solutions that I know about are green roofs, retention ponds, and more vegetation throughout the city. I think that by adding more trees and shrubs into the city we can benefit in so many ways and will lead to less storm water runoff, a reduction in the time of overflows, and a healthier environment for people to live and work in.