Making a rain garden

This new little garden is flooded after the storm - but no worries because it is a rain garden and this is meant to happen. The idea is to take water off the road - hence the kerb cuts to allow water to flow into the three new sunken gardens along the grass verge. Fallowfield has poor drainage and floods regularly after heavy rain, but this time there was much less flooding than usual and it dissipated more quickly. The plants need to tolerate both floods and droughts, as that is the weather we get these days.

After the rain, Fallowfield rain garden number 1

Why a water usage survey?

Transition Cambridge is running a survey on how we use water, and what water saving measures we take. Why? Water shortage has been a concern for some time but seeing the film Pure Clean Water reminded me again of the acute need for us to reduce water demand. Lack of water has recently stymied government plans for growth but even with no extra homes or businesses we do not have enough water. I could go on but perhaps you know already – or you can read about it here.

Suffice to say, climate change means more extreme weather – wetter winters like this one but also drier ones and longer droughts. Our water supply from the chalk aquifer under the Gog Magog hills buffers some of the variation but has its limits – and our current level of demand has already caused irreparable damage to chalk streams which is why Nine Wells is no longer an SSSI [1].

Our water is incredibly cheap: in Cambridge the average water bill (excluding sewerage) is currently £163/year – 45p/day - which is 29% lower than the national average [2]. This price hardly reflects its value to our health and wellbeing, and does little to encourage water saving, even if you do have a meter. However there is a lot we can do with little or no effort. How often do you wash your clothes or bedlinen? Do you save water from cooking vegetables to pre-soak the dirty dishes? Do you flush the toilet every time you have a pee?