Time to Harvest!

It is raining today; and at the time I am writing this, it is raining very hard. Weather forecasts predict that in the next 24 hours we will get about ¾ to an inch of rain. And what does this mean? It means it is time to harvest – rain harvest that is.

Within our overall mission, Banana Kelly is committed to the dual goals of building community and improving the environment. One way we accomplish this is through our green infrastructure initiative. We started the greening program at our Prospect Avenue location with a rainwater collection system and garden. Our residents took control of the open space, monitor it, benefit from it through the enjoyment of the garden and whatever they choose to plant and harvest. We as a city benefit from lessening the chances of combined sewer overflows, or CSOs, where raw sewage is deposited into our water bodies during heavy rains like today’s.

Banana Kelly’s Prospect Avenue site is an instructive example. There the building has a flat roof area of about 36,000 square feet. An inch of rainfall generates about 2,200 gallons of rainwater. Our rain harvesting system (drains, cisterns, pipes and raised wetland planters) have the capacity to hold over 3,600 gallons of rainwater. Today, Prospect Avenue is harvesting between 1,650 and 2,200 gallons of rainwater. All of this rainwater will be captured in our rain harvesting/backyard garden system. Residents enjoy the garden; the water that surrounds us all is a bit cleaner as a result.

We have two such systems in operation, with two others in construction, and others still in planning. Some may say that this kind of work represents the proverbial “drop in the bucket,” pun intended. But as we all know, a bucket has limited storage capacity. One drop of water beyond that capacity causes an overflow. The more green infrastructure systems we implement, the closer we will get to keeping our water treatment “bucket” from overflowing. The next time we take time to enjoy the Bronx River, or Orchard Beach, or the East River, we are doing it with the knowledge that Banana Kelly is helping to keep our precious water systems clean and healthy for future generations.