What a Disaster!

For a number of years now, many of us have been oohing and ahhing about Montecillo, El Paso's stellar example of smart growth. Although it may have some restaurants and stores integrated into its layout, it is turning out to be one huge environmental disaster. In this case "new urbanism", if it can be called that, has sadly neglected green infrastructure/low impact development. It is just the same sad old destruction of the desert by plowing up hills and dumping dirt into arroyos. It. along with the Top Golf development threatens surrounding eco-systems. For example, someone got a close-up look of Cement Lake the other day. From the description, it should probably be renamed "silt lake". 

EPT is responsible for both the Montecillo development and the Top Golf development. The City is responsible for permitting them to do what they are doing and these permits go back a number of years now.

Behind the Draft House

Return to the Alamo Draft House. Note how the drainage plans are not working. Keep this in mind. There is another huge problem with the development of the land that now contains the movie theater and soon will see other businesses. Was the destruction of a hillside and arroyo the result of a need to do flood control for Montecillo all along? Rather than having "smart" growth, we have a cancer that is eating up the environment.

Detention Pond behind Alamo Draft House

Arroyo adjacent to Fire Station #31. Note infrastruture debris

Once again, look at the "drainage" control at the Draft House. The gunnite and other strategies have not held back the erosion and the spilling of silt onto the parking lot. This same strategy using gunnite was apparently used at an arroyo adjacent to Fire Station #31 on Mesa Park Drive. With just a bit of rainfall recently (not a horrendous storm such as the one in 2006) the entire infrastructure was washed out. 

Montecillo

Now take a look at the stepped development of Montecillo. Note the same use of fabric and gunnite and note the silt already seeping through the "barrier". 

Click image to enlarge.

More especially, look how the hills are plowed up and see the arroyos being filled in. Forget having any really natural features. This smart growth is concrete and asphalt and apartment-looking buildings.

What happens when you cover-up arroyos? Does the water in a storm obey the new path of tiny culverts? No, the water follows the historic flood plain. Like Superman it does leaps and bounds and hydraulic jumps over the insufficient culverts, taking out backyards, washing boulders, rocks and debris down hill.

Is there a drainage or development plan that the City of El Paso doesn't approve?

Ever heard of swales?

What a disaster!

Monday Odds and Ends

Big thanks to El Paso Inc. reporter, Dave Crowder, for doing a story after reading an Elpasonaturally post. His Inc. story is: Is Topgolf construction threatening an I-10 embankment?

On Facebook find and join: Share El Paso - Plants and Animals. Great posts by William Hoover and images by Liz DeMoultrie and others. This tells us what we are trying to save here in the El Paso Southwest.

Download this free booklet online: CASTNER RANGE BOOKLET: SUMMARY AND UP TO DATE STATUS ON EFFORTS. Janaé Reneaud Field, Frontera Land Alliance Director, says:

"[It] tells you the story of El Paso’s Castner Range, the 7,081-acre closed firing range that still belongs to Fort Bliss. All of you have played a part on Castner Range in recent years, so you know the campaign we have waged to keep it conserved for all time. The booklet tells the history of the Range from pre-historic days through its years as an active artillery site (1926-1966), then into the early 1970s when parts of the Range were transferred to the City of El Paso for development, and onward to our recent, vigorous and increasingly-successful campaign on behalf of Castner’s conservation. The booklet makes it clear that El Pasoans stand united in their desire to conserve Castner Range, whether as a separate National Monument or as a part of the Franklin Mountains State Park."

Mahatma Gandhi said: “Be the change that you wish to see in the world.” We can do all that we can to oppose Trump's environmental policies. What we immediately and most certainly have control over is our lifestyles. Read two stories posted in Grist: Just trading beef for beans could get the United States near its CO2 goal and Now you can plant a tree to offset Trump’s climate policies. Be sure to check out Grow the Forest.

Definitely of interest: How Green Energy Will Help Slow Nuclear Proliferation.
It's from Defense One.

Have a great week. 

Makes You Wonder

Alamo Drafthouse Parking Lot. Erosion is coming from the Arroyo side.

Yesterday I mentioned TxDOT Regional Engineer Robert Bielek's concern about the development at the Top Golf site. It seems that the developer has underestimated how much run-off the development will cause and, thus, in Bielek's words, "compromise the stability of the embankment upon which I-10 sits." Although alerted to the problem, the City continues to "permit" EPT to develop the land. Bielek has told the City that TxDOT "will consider the City equally responsible for any damage to to the I-10 embankment or our [TxDOT's] drainage structure because of this oversight." 

Surely our city leaders care more about the safety of people and the integrity of our freeways and less about whether they could win a legal battle with TxDOT. Surely our city leaders want to do the right thing by satisfying TxDOT with an acceptable plan. I sent a link to yesterday's blog post to Mayor Margo, City Manager Tommy Gonzalez and Khalil Zaied. I asked for responses. As expected, there have been no responses. (One possible good note: Mr. Bielek just now told me that "[the TxDOT] staff has been meeting with the developer but no final resolution as yet." Sounds as if yesterday's post has had impact.)

I am aware that EPT also did the Alamo Drafthouse project. Many of us watched in horror as an arroyo was destroyed and an entire hillside dug out. The destruction of this open space was justified by the fact that is would be a "new urban" project. 

I went by the Alamo Drafthouse today and noticed an inordinate amount of sand/dirt in the parking lot. I asked the manager about it and was told that they get the erosion every time that it rains. I'm not an engineer, nor do I play one on televsion and I don't really know about the drainage solutions that I saw. However, what I saw does concern me. Over time, judging from the dirt in the lot, there will be a considerable amount of erosion. 

This picture and the one below are from the retaining wall between the entrance to the theater parking lot and the hillside topped by the apartments. Note the stain and rocks from erosion.

Apparently EPT's solution to the instability of the hill next to the theater, was to put some kind of fabric on top of the slope and drill horizontal pipes into the hillside. As the pictures show, the erosion doesn't come down the slope, it feeds through the pipes.

I do wonder whether similar drainage solutions are being used by EPT at the Top Golf site and, if so, I better understand what Bob Bielek is saying.

I certainly would not live in the apartments above Alamo Drafthouse. 

Will the City of El Paso Destroy Cement Lake?

Cement Lake

The City of El Paso's apparent failure to address a critical drainage issue at the Top Golf construction site might very well destroy one of El Paso's rare gems, Cement Lake. Moreover, according to TxDOT Regional Engineer, Bob Bielek, the failure of the City to address the matter with the developer of Top Golf, EPT Land Communities, might also "overload the structure and compromise the stability of the embankment upon which I-10 sits.  This could have additional effects on the lake such as excess siltation."

Bielek also says that "it does appear that the developer is underestimating the contribution of the development to the overall runoff, and there appears to be insufficient retention on the developer’s site to adequately meter the flows in a way that will protect the embankment and the drainage structure."

The City of El Paso has apparently provided the developer with a permit to construct Top Golf but has failed to consult with TxDOT regarding drainage requirements including not just the embankment of the freeway but Cement Lake. The developer has furnished no credible plan to TxDOT.

Bielek told City Council about this problem last March. Elpasonaturally has asked him three times since then whether they have recived a credible plan. Mr. Bielek's last reply came nine days ago on July 24th in an email: "Still waiting on an acceptable design."

Bielek did contact the City Manager, Tommy Gonzalez, months ago and yet there is still no "acceptable plan". It would seem that the City has permitted the developer to undermine the integrity of I-10 and destroy Cement Lake. Bielek says, "that we [TxDOT] will consider the City equally responsible for any damage to the I-10 embankment or our drainage structure because of this oversight."

El Paso Water, city environmental and open space activists have sought for many years to preserve El Paso's natural Cement Lake.