Nature Near Transit

Connecting Green Infrastructure and Public Art to Transit Resilience

CNT’s Nature Near Transit Program strives to improve local climate, economic, and cultural resilience in select Chicago-area neighborhoods located near CTA transit stops through community-driven creative placemaking initiatives. The effort aligns with the SPARCC Elevated Chicago target areas for investment and enjoys support from Elevated Chicago and Enterprise Community Partners.

Chicago’s transit system is an incredible community asset, but not all transit stops are created equal. Through this program, CNT works with local community partners and stakeholders to install complementary, site-scale green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) and public art near transit stations to support these areas in becoming destinations for local economic and community development. Both the GSI and public art installations are collaboratively-designed and, where possible, locally-made, to increase the sense of community ownership of the projects.

The GSI projects are meant to be demonstrative in nature, providing some stormwater management benefit, but primarily installed as educational tools to show what needs to be done on larger, distributed scales to reduce community flooding impacts. The public art is meant to thematically represent local cultural priorities, as well as the long-term climate and cultural benefits of investments in sustainable water infrastructure.

Current partners include Garfield Park Community Council, Logan Square Neighborhood Association, LUCHA, OPEN Center for the Arts, Rudd Resources, and Washington Park Development Group.

This program is designed to be replicable, with stormwater management demonstration projects that can scale to include different green infrastructure solutions throughout Chicago, on both publicly and privately-owned land. To help replicate the project outside of Chicago, a learning exchange with SPARCC partners in Atlanta will build regional models and best practices for this and future efforts.

To learn more, please contact Ryan Scherzinger. 

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Research + Further Reading

Climate Change Preparedness of Great Lakes Communities

CNT and Environmental Consulting & Technology, Inc.
March 7, 2023

This report examines changing rainfall amounts across five cities in the Great Lakes region and seeks to understand whether the regulatory permits and community planning efforts are aligned with robust and current rainfall estimates. Rainfall amount is a key factor considered in stormwater and sewer infrastructure design and dictates the cost of infrastructure as well as its performance. Over the last few decades, agencies and jurisdictions responsible for infrastructure, including storm and combined sewer infrastructure (much of which was constructed decades ago) have anecdotally reported that event precipitation amounts (“Precipitation Frequency Estimates” or PFEs) have increased significantly. Cities across the region have suffered accordingly. Detroit, for example suffered massive flooding in 2014, 2016, 2019, and 2021, causing economic, environmental, psychological, public health, and financial hardship on residents and businesses. Further, these floods damaged public facilities, museums, and schools across the city. These trends are unfortunately not unique to Detroit, and rampant flooding is now a common occurrence across Great Lakes cities. Finally, forecasts of future event precipitation amounts are significantly more than what they are today, suggesting the impacts of storms and the resulting damages will continue to get worse.

This report’s focus is on Milwaukee (Wisconsin), Chicago (Illinois), Detroit (Michigan), South Bend (Indiana), and Buffalo (New York). For the purposes of analyses, the specific geography for each metro area was defined by the service area of their respective water/wastewater utility/agency.

topics: Climate, Great Lakes Water Infrastructure, Green Infrastructure, Urban Flooding, Water

 

Income, Location Efficiency, and VMT: Affordable Housing as a Climate Strategy

Gregory L. Newmark Ph.D and Peter M. Haas Ph.D
December 16, 2015

This paper combines detailed travel-survey, transit-service, and land-use data to estimate a model for predicting the role of income and location efficiency in reducing household vehicle-miles traveled (VMT). The research then applies this model to census data collected in the most transit-rich areas of California. The research finds strong justification for California’s current support of location-efficient affordable housing as a strategy to reduce VMT and mitigate climate change.

This working paper was first posted in July 2015. The California Strategic Growth Council commissioned an academic review of the paper in order to consider its use in funding formulas for the allocation of cap and trade funds for the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities Program. The working paper was revised in response to review comments and reposted on December 16, 2015.

topics: Climate, Transit-Oriented Development, Transportation + Community Development

 

Transforming and Embracing Innovation in Ohio’s 9th Congressional District: Moving towards Sustainable, Efficient and Reliable Energy

CNT
December 1, 2011

Northern Ohio has enough wind, solar and biogas potential to meet all of its electricity needs, but only a small fraction of the region's energy comes from these sources. In spite of its vast untapped renewable resources, production of renewable energy in the 9th Congressional District is not economically viable without supportive state and federal policies and incentives. This paper lays the conceptual and analytical foundation for a new energy economy in Northern Ohio.

topics: Climate, Energy

 

Tree Asset Management in Portland, Oregon

by CNT
June 28, 2011

This study shows that Portland is well-positioned to pilot a tree asset management program that would lay the groundwork for turning its tree canopy into a bondable asset, similar to bridges and roads. The study identified six steps through which Portland and other cities can create a tree asset management program. The study also provides several case studies of other cities that are attempting to turn their trees into assets.

topics: Climate, Green Infrastructure

 

Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Chicago: Emissions Inventories and Reduction Strategies for Chicago and its Metropolitan Region

CNT
February 1, 2010

A greenhouse gas emissions inventory was conducted for Chicago and its metropolitanregion for the years 2000 and 2005. Emissions ofcarbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, and sulfur hexafluoride totaled 34.7 millionmetric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents (MMTCO2e) in Chicago in 2000 with 91 percent of emissions attributable to the indirect emissions associated with electricity consumption, the direct emissions of natural gas use, and the direct emissions of the transportation sector. A portfolio of 33 potential emissions reduction strategies was analyzed that, implemented together, could meet Chicago’s target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to 25 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. The largest potential for reduction is found in the areas with the largest emissions—energy use in buildings and transport. Compared to its metropolitan region, Chicago is found to have existing transportation efficiencies on a per household basis that can be an example for other communities.

topics: Climate

 
 
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