Staten Island's Bluebelt
A New Solution to a Very Old Problem
Today, across the southern half of Staten Island you can find an ingenious new system for keeping the water on and around the Island clean. It’s called the Bluebelt - and it’s so clever it’s hiding in plain sight, ‘disguised’ as parkland. But this ‘new’ system from the 1990’s is trying to fix problems from all the way back in the 1800’s. Once we understand what the Bluebelt is, we’ll discover why it was the perfect solution for Staten Island today.
The problems were about water and solved by using water in a new way. Because people associate a specific color with water, this solution was called the BLUEbelt.
How the Bluebelt Works
When it rains, any water that falls on hard surfaces that does not evaporate and is not absorbed by natural areas with grass and soil needs to ‘go’ somewhere. This stormwater either makes large puddles or flows into the streets. Normally, stormwater is directed to a nearby body of water by creating a system of pipes under the streets. Storm drains are the openings at the street’s edge that collect the stormwater and funnel it to the pipes beneath the street. But this solution often transfers pollution from the streets to the ocean or the rivers and bays around the city.The Bluebelt tries to capture the stormwater and use it as a resource rather than a nuisance. It delivers stormwater to engineered systems that are designed to mimic natural streams and ponds which help control flooding, pollution and erosion. One example can be found at Lemon Creek .
Click here to learn more about the urban water cycle and what happens to our stormwater.
A storm drain that is part of the Bluebelt. Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
By diverting the stormwater to streams that meander, or wind back and forth, the water slows down naturally. As this happens, much of the sediment (eroded soil and small pebbles) that might have been picked up fall to the bottom of the stream and are kept out of the Bay. Sometimes, the stormwater is directed from the street to a specially-built rocky 'pond' where the water slows down again. This is called a 'forebay' and can easily be emptied by DEP staff so the sediment doesn't build up. After the 'forebay' is usually a series of tiny waterfall-like features called a step-pool system that lead to a rocky stream. All this helps keep the movement of the water as natural as possible.
A view of the step-pool system. Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
The Bluebelt project also works to preserve, restore, and enhance the land around the natural waterways in the area. Many plants grow naturally at the edges of the Bluebelt, and these plants help create a more natural ecosystem for birds, frogs, turtles and mammals. Landscape architects consult with naturalists to choose new plants and trees to add when the engineers need to dig up areas in the Bluebelt for improvements. Some species of native plants are chosen because their roots are home to beneficial bacteria that help clean the water. Other species are chosen specifically to attract or feed other helpful species. Designing a system like this helps create new habitats for native species.
Water-loving plants grow in the waters of the Bluebelt. Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
In the old system, a concrete pipe with fast-moving water would create a hostile habitat for fish, far different from the slower, rocky streams designed for the Bluebelt. These new streams allow for fish to thrive. Even some of the concrete pipes that guide Bluebelt streams under the streets have rocks built in to make them friendlier to fish and other aquatic creatures that need to move from area to area. In another example, the right kind of landscaping and design can help populations of insects, like dragonflies, which are considered useful to humans because they love to eat mosquitos. Fish also love to eat mosquitoes and mosquito eggs, so that’s one reason why designing a habitat suitable for them is important. With all of these native species eating mosquitos, we can have a more comfortable summer!
A baby eel! Image Credit: NYC DEP via Flickr
Underground sand filters are built to help clean the water before it reaches ponds (also known as detention basins) and rehabilitated streams. In some cases, specific native plants are placed along the water’s edge to pull pollution from the water through their root systems. In many other areas the pipes are fitted with 'trash racks' which collect litter and are emptied regularly to keep soda bottles, food wrappers, and other common litter from the streets from going any further into the Bluebelt.
A view of a detention basin. Image Credit: NYC DEP via Flickr
Because local flooding is always a concern, these Bluebelts are created with 'emergency escape' options when a huge storm starts to overwhelm the system. This is a 'riser box' which empties the pond into an 'escape' pipe when the water rises too high.
A riser box. Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
Some reminders of the Bluebelt’s presence are reflected in the beautiful objects found in the middle of the streets nearby. Normally, you might see an object in the street that looks like this:
Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
Take a look at the image to the right. What do you see?
This cover has an Egret on it. Egrets are long-legged birds that wade in the water watching for small fish to swim by. When it spots a fish, the Egret darts its beak into the water and snaps the fish into its mouth. These birds need clean water that is not polluted to be able to see their prey and for their meals to be healthy.
Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
This cover has an Osprey on it. Osprey are birds of prey that like to build their large nests of sticks on high, dead trees (or on the tops of utility poles). They fly over water looking for fish and when they spot fish they dive down to the water and grab their food with their sharp, powerful talons. Ospreys also need clean water without a lot of pollution.
Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
The Bluebelt is a project which uses natural elements, like grass and trees, to solve a specific problem. What colors do you think of when you think of grass and trees?
The Bluebelt is an example of a green infrastructure project.
Over fifteen Bluebelt systems can be found across southern Staten Island! There are even a few in parts of Queens too. This Green Infrastructure is a special feature of Staten Island that helps prevent flooding; keeps local waters cleaner; creates natural habitats to support local ecosystems; and creates improved public green spaces for New Yorkers. It is a great example for neighborhoods all across America!
To understand why the Bluebelt is so ingenious, let’s go back in time. New York City looked very different five hundred years ago. Thick forests, lush meadows, and clean rivers teeming with life surrounded the first Europeans who arrived in this region and began to create settlements. No one planned for a population of over 8.5 million people.
Water & Waste
The earliest Europeans’ population was small enough that there were few worries about finding enough drinking water. Getting rid of their waste was another chore that didn't concern them all that much. They could use their food scraps to feed their animals, which lived in their yards. Ash from their fires could be used for fertilizer or for making soap or candles. But their 'human waste' (like poop and pee) was a different story.
In Europe, it was often dumped in the streets and the new New Yorkers did the same. They then hoped for rain to wash it away and into the nearby rivers, which would bring it out to the ocean when the tides went out. In such small quantities, it would seem to disappear into the vast, salty Atlantic, which was un-drinkable anyway.
Manhattan in the 1700s. Image Credit: Archibald Robinson, via Wikimedia Commons
But as the city grew, finding water and dumping waste became more challenging. With more residents, the small ponds no longer provided enough drinking water. Also, so much human waste (as well as animal waste) had washed into these water bodies that only the poorest inhabitants would drink from them. The next solution was to go underground; wells were dug to find the water table.
A view of the busy Five Points neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in the 1800s. Image Credit: George Catlin, via Wikimedia Commons
What's a water table?
When rain falls on a surface that is porous (which means there are many gaps or holes for water to move through) then gravity pulls the water down through the soil and gravel until it hits a hard surface that will not absorb it. In New York City, this impermeable layer is often bedrock, the hard, solid layer not far below the street. The water is trapped in the soil and gravel above the bedrock and, like a sponge, this porous layer above holds onto the water. If you dig a hole down into soil and gravel like this, water will quickly fill the hole. A well is a hole that reaches down into the water table (which is also known as an aquifer).
Illustration Credit: Stalin Espinal
However, the other problem facing this growing town was solved the same way: by digging a hole. Since there were so many residents living so close to each other, it wasn't practical to put their human waste into the streets anymore. So, 'privies' or 'outhouses' were built behind the residences. They were small sheds built above a deep hole where people went to poop and pee. Their waste would fall into the deep holes and it seemed to disappear, even if it did smell a little bit (sometimes a lot if the weather was hot or rainy, or they got too full). Unfortunately the waste didn't disappear. Instead it was sitting right in the path of the rainwater heading down to the water table. So, the drinking water became polluted. If you didn't boil your water long enough it could make you sick. Sometimes the dirty water could even kill you.
Residents drawing water from an underground well. Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Eventually, New York City began getting its drinking water from far away, and that's still where we get our water today.
But our waste remained local. With clean water arriving through pipes every day many families decided they no longer wanted to poop and pee in a hole outside. They wanted indoor toilets! That meant we needed a way to get rid of all of that dirty water.
Our first solution looked a lot like our old solution: get it to the ocean so it could mix with that huge amount of clean salt water! Many pipes were built in the mid-1800's to take waste from homes and apartments and deliver it to the rivers and bays around the city so the tides could 'take it away'.
This map from 1865 shows New York City's first sewers beneath the streets. Zoom in to see the thick black lines on the street - those are the sewers!
Map Credit: Egbert Viele, via David Rumsey Map Collection
Eventually, as the city continued to grow, this solution also failed. Can you guess why?
At this time there were no automobiles. Most of the traffic on the streets of New York was horse-powered, which meant lots of horse poop. Tons of manure were left on the streets. This pollution would wash into storm drains on the street when it rained. These drains were connected to the sewer pipes that collected human waste and transported it, by gravity, to the river.
Can you imagine what it would be like living at the water's edge, seeing and smelling all this water pouring into the rivers? Would you want to live there? Who do you think did live there?
A busy day by the water. Note that "North River" is an early name for the Hudson River. Image Credit: NYPL Digital Collections , 1882
19th Century Wastewater
By the end of the 1800's, we created systems called sewage (or wastewater) treatment plants to clean this water. They were like big factories for making cleaner water. The dirty water was 'intercepted' by a new system of larger pipes, connected to the old pipes from the buildings and the streets. When the dirty water arrived it would be run through machines to filter it and separate out the solid waste. Chemicals would be added to kill bacteria. Then, the water could be emptied into the rivers much cleaner than before.
Use this map to explore sewage treatment plants near you!
This was a vast improvement. As the technology improved and the city paid to improve the sewage treatment plants, the benefits to the surrounding bodies of water were apparent. New York City created the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) with a mission to deliver our drinking water and to clean our wastewater. Today, the technology used by the DEP is so good that once the sewage is treated the result is water usually considered clean enough for humans to swim in! But this system doesn't always work as well as we want. Sometimes, in fact, sewage flows straight into the rivers and bays, just like the ‘old days’. The DEP knows about it and it's not a mystery why it happens.
A little bit of sewage leaks into a New York waterway. Image Credit: Amelia Zaino
Remember how the system was developed. Wastewater was collected from homes and the streets. First, the pipes were built to move the dirty water to the river, then the new 'interceptor' pipes redirected it to the sewage treatment plants. But it was always known that if it rained a lot one day, then too much stormwater would end up at the sewage treatment plants. If that happened, the building could be overwhelmed or flooded with sewage. Can you imagine what it would be like to be working in the plant on a day like that?
To prevent such an event, the pipes that emptied into the rivers were kept as a part of the system. Today, if it rains too much in certain parts of NYC, the excess stormwater mixes with the sewage and overflows, not into the treatment plants, but into the rivers and bays. This is called a Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) and it is a solution that solves one problem, but causes another.
Illustration Credit: Stalin Espinal
Luckily, not all of New York City was developed in the late 1800's! Many areas were developed in the middle of the 1900's and at that time we had built a better system. This new system gave sewage its own set of pipes (called a Sanitary Sewer) that go directly to the treatment plants with no mixture of stormwater. The stormwater went into its own system, called a storm sewer, which directed the water from the streets to the nearest stream, river or bay. This is called a Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System, shortened to 'MS4' (because there is one 'M' word followed by four 'S' words). This system effectively solved the threat of a heavy rain overwhelming the treatment plants. Because the systems are separate there is no risk of the combined sewer overflow.
Plus, since we no longer have to worry about tons of horse manure in the streets being washed away with the rain, it seems like a great solution, right? What do you think?
Use this map to explore where stormwater is directly sent into our waterways. These points are represented by yellow triangles. The blue droplets are where water is sent into parts of the Bluebelt.
Well, this was a major improvement that solved many problems, but it's still not perfect. Automobiles often leak. For example, they can leak antifreeze, windshield wiper fluid, oil, gasoline, brake fluid or transmission fluid. All of these are damaging to the environment.
When people take care of the grass on their lawns, they often spray it with chemicals to help it grow better (fertilizers) or chemicals to kill unwanted bugs (pesticides) or chemicals to kill unwanted 'weeds' (herbicides). When people take their dogs out for walks, the poop and pee often ends up in the grass and dirt along the edge of the street. And, of course, humans throw garbage on the sidewalks and in the streets. When it rains all of this ends up in the storm sewer and eventually in the rivers and bays around New York.
Those strange rainbows in the street? That's oil from someone's car! Image Credit: Jonathan Turer
In some places, where few homes are built, the storm drains empty onto uninhabited land and the flow of water creates a temporary artificial stream that leads to a river or bay. Over time, this water wears away the nearby land (this is called erosion) and brings pollution and mud into the river or bay. As the erosion continues, it is harder to find people who want to buy the land to build homes, offices or stores. They are worried that the steep banks of these temporary, unpredictable, dirty 'streams' will continue to erode further and destroy anything they build.
So you can probably understand why a new solution would be so desirable, right?
Erosion around homes. Image Credit: Polk County Soil & Water Conservation District .
That new solution would be created on Staten Island.
Staten Island is an unusual part of New York City. It is about 60 square miles in area and approximately 500,000 people live there. Compared to much of the rest of New York City (the nation's largest, most densely populated urban area), Staten Island feels quiet and small in scale.
Developing Staten Island
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European settlers arrived in the 1600s and found the native Lenape peoples settled all across the island. The new arrivals often set up farms nearby these older settlements.
The image on the right is a view of New York Harbor from Staten Island, as it would have looked in 1777.
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Just across the harbor, the island of Manhattan was growing larger and more prosperous. Many of the Manhattan residents, old and new, began to build homes and businesses at the northern end of Staten Island, where access to Manhattan was easiest. On the southern end you could still find many of the farmers.
A historic view of Tottenville, a neighborhood in Staten Island. Image Credit: NYPL Digital Collections
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You could also find people who harvested oysters or caught fish in the waters off the Island. It was quiet and the land was mostly made up of fields and forests. A railroad was built to connect these small villages to the ferry boats on the northern shore.
The Staten Island Ferry Terminal and the Staten Island Railway in the early 1900s. Image Credit: NYPL Digital Collections
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People built homes here and there, at a slow pace, until the 1920's. Staten Island was now officially a part of New York City and the city's population was growing. Many people felt rich and wanted to buy land. At the same time, many farmers felt that Staten Island was no longer a good, quiet place to be a farmer. They sold their fields and land to developers who thought people would want to buy smaller pieces of property for building a home.
Staten Island ended up being a great opportunity for many people. But some people were so excited they bought the land without even looking at it! Why do you think that might not be such a good idea?
When they found out they bought land that had a stream running through it, or a whole piece of wet marshy land they were very disappointed. And many people were so disappointed, they just gave up, especially when they lost their savings and their jobs in the Great Depression a few years later. So the City of New York ended up owning and holding on to their properties.
An advertisement for new homes on Staten Island, marketed as "South New York". Image Credit: The Evening World.
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In 1964 the Verrazzano Bridge connected Staten Island to Brooklyn, which physically connected the Island to the larger city. New roads were constructed, criss-crossing the Island and large numbers of Brooklyn residents decided to look for new homes in Staten Island. Many people wondered what the city would do with all the land it was holding on to, especially as developers began building new residential neighborhoods. Would the city try to sell their swampy land so developers could pave it over and build new homes? The City decided to wait, and worked to protect the land from builders.
During this period of new building, a problem emerged. It cost developers a lot to build new roads and it was complicated to get the electricity and water hooked up where it hadn't been before. The city said if they wanted to connect these new buildings to sanitary sewers there would also need to be storm drains in the streets. Since the city didn't have a plan for storm drains, and developers didn’t want to pay for it themselves, nothing was built. New York City knew it didn't want to connect the storm drains to the sanitary sewers, but the alternative of sending stormwater directly to the water around the Island wasn't appealing either. Not only would that cause pollution to be delivered to local waters, but it would also end up emptying almost all of the remaining wetlands on the island.
Surprisingly, these new homes had something in common with the old apartments built in Manhattan years earlier. People didn't have to go outside to 'use the bathroom' but all the wastewater from the houses was being sent down into the ground near the houses. This is called a 'septic system' and is a solution still being used across the country. However, when there was a lot of rain, the streets (remember, no drains!) and even the septic systems in the backyards would flood, causing a smelly, dangerous mess. Can you think of why flooded streets could be dangerous?
A different solution was needed and the City realized that all that land it was holding on to would be the key to finding a new way ahead. Streets could have storm drains that could empty into pipes that connected to all those wetlands and streams. If the City could include a way to control pollution and erosion, this idea would be a major improvement to what anyone else had created!
And thus, the Bluebelt was born.
The Bluebelt Near You
On Staten Island, the Bluebelt helps keeps the watershed, or all of the streams flowing into New York Harbor and Raritan Bay, clean. Use the map below to explore sections of the Bluebelt in the borough - is there one near your school?
Go further! To learn more about what makes our city's coastline such a fascinating place, click here to explore The Water At the Edge of Our City!
Staten Island’s Bluebelt is a fascinating place that is beautiful, but also very helpful. Try looking for signs of the Bluebelt in your neighborhood!
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