Glendale Public School Rain Garden – Brampton, Ontario
Credit Valley Conservation led the design and construction of a 965 m2 rain garden on the grounds of Glendale Public School, within the Fletcher’s Creek Sustainable Neighborhood Action Plan area in Brampton. Aside from adding beauty to the area, the rain garden can capture and infiltrate 200 m3 of runoff per rain event, addressing an existing drainage problem on the school property. Annually, the garden can filter and cool up to 6000 m3 of water, which is equivalent to almost 2.5 Olympic size swimming pools. In total, the garden project added 800 m3 of storage volume to the floodplain, which will reduce flooding downstream during large rain events. These hydrologic and thermal benefits contribute to improving the health of Fletcher’s Creek, which serves as habitat to cold water fish species like the provincially endangered Redside Dace.
During construction, an innovative approach was applied to re-use site soils. Soils from the site were amended on site to make the growing media used in the rain garden / bioretention area, which eliminated the need to haul it offsite and bring in a pre-made growing media. This significantly reduced transportation costs and associated greenhouse gas emissions.
In addition to the above benefits, this project provided an experiential learning opportunity for about 305 students from Glendale P.S. who participated in the design process by selecting plants and contributing ideas for the shape of the garden and the amenities included. These students, together with over 40 volunteers from Canon Canada, took part in the planting day. The garden has over 2000 plants, many of which are native and drought tolerant, and which were chosen specifically to attract birds and pollinators.
Download the Glendale Public School Rain Garden Case Study for more details on this project.