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: Green Infrastructure Center Seeks to Create Greener Communities

Thursday, July 26, Charlottesville, Virginia:
The Green Infrastructure Center Inc. has formed a new partnership with the Commonwealth of Virginia to help communities utilize new state models to assess and protect their natural heritage, including abundant wildlife, clean water, and recreation areas. The state’s Virginia Conservation Lands Needs Assessment Project has created models that identify features including intact natural habitats, forests and grasslands, cultural and historic resources, water quality, and sensitive coastal areas. The GIC will utilize these models and work with localities to identify their assets and help develop tools that can be used to protect important resources. Five pilot projects are proposed across the state; the first project will start in Madison County in August. In this first project, the GIC will partner with the county and students at the University of Virginia’s School of Architecture to identify county assets and model different growth scenarios, so that the residents can make informed choices about their future. Working farms, forests, and scenic views are identified as key assests in the county’s comprehensive plan and this project will help residents determine how to best protect them.

Green infrastructure includes the connected natural systems and ecological processes that provide critical functions, such as habitat for wildlife, water storage and filtration, air quality, and healthful lifestyles. Green infrastructure planning entails inventorying these natural assets, identifying opportunities for their protection and/or restoration, and developing a coordinated strategy to channel development and re-development to the most appropriate locations.

According to the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, “If Virginia continues to grow as it has, more land will be developed in the next 40 years than has been since the Jamestown settlement was established in 1607.” The Virginia Department of Forestry has predicted that if current development trends continue, Virginia will lose a million acres of forest in the next 25 years. According to GIC Executive Director Karen Firehock, “While these statistics are indicators of change, they don’t reveal the full extent of future challenges. Many of the forests that remain will be too fractured by roads or ‘gray’ infrastructure, rendering forest tracts too small to support healthy populations of key species.” These isolated forest patches will, in effect, become islands disconnected from other forests and the wildlife species needed to maintain diverse gene pools for survival. Firehock explained the need for green infrastructure planning by noting that, “We can grow smart and save money if we identify and work with our natural systems, which filter stormwater and clean the air. By mapping and protecting these assets first, or restoring them where they are degraded, we’ll save funds in the long term.”

The Green Infrastructure Center Inc. is a new nonprofit organization located in Charlottesville, Virginia that was formed to assist communities in developing strategies for protecting and conserving their ecological and cultural assets through environmentally-sensitive decisions, lifestyles, and planning. The GIC conducts research, economic analysis, land use planning and asset assessment, and mapping to provide the tools needed by communities to protect and restore green assets. A partnership between E2 Inc. and the GIC provides additional capacity and services for the center’s nonprofit mission to assist communities with green infrastructure planning. Initial funds for the pilot projects are provided by the Virginia Dept. of Forestry and the USDA’s Urban and Community Forestry Program.

Contact Information:

Karen Firehock, Executive Director
firehock@gicinc.org
434.975.6700 x222