Stormwater – Page 2 – Belmont Citizens Forum

Carrots and Sticks Nudge Belmont’s Cleanup

Environment, Newsletter, November 2020, Sewers, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Nov 062020

Carrots and Sticks Nudge Belmont’s Cleanup

By Anne-Marie Lambert Two key drivers are nudging Belmont to clean up our waterways and protect us from the storms coming with climate change: the threat behind an Environmental Protection Agency Consent Order and the tempting Massachusetts Municipal Vulnerability Program (MVP) Every six months, Belmont is obliged to file a report with the New England region of the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to demonstrate compliance with a 2017 consent order under the Clean Water Act. The town has to show steady progress cleaning up the sewage pollution Belmont has sent to Boston Harbor due to the intermingling of Belmont’s [READ MORE]

Belmont Waterways Get Failing Grades

Newsletter, Sept/Oct 2020, Sewers, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Sep 032020

By Meg Muckenhoupt The Mystic River’s most recent water quality report card, released on August 13, gives Winn’s Brook an F for 2019—and the Little River and Alewife Brook earned Ds. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) creates the annual report card in collaboration with the Mystic River Watershed Association. It grades segments of the Mystic River’s lakes, river, and streams on how frequently they meet bacterial standards for swimming and boating. The Upper Mystic Lake and the Chelsea River got an A grade; they met boating and swimming standards 90% or more of the time in 2019. Winn’s Brook [READ MORE]

New Rock Meadow Parking Plan Proposed

Air Quality, Environment, July-August 2020, Newsletter, Open Space, Parking, Plants, Stormwater, Traffic, Water Quality Comments Off

Jun 302020

By Jeffrey North and Mary Trudeau The Belmont Conservation Commission recently engaged a team of Northeastern University students to explore parking lot and stormwater drainage improvements for Rock Meadow. As visitors to Rock Meadow can attest, the parking lot is inefficient, rutted, partially paved, and often filled with pockets of standing water. Improvements have been called for since at least 1968, when the report, A Program for Renewing Rock Meadow, stated the obvious: “The entrance is not attractive and does not do justice to the beautiful area beyond.” The arrival experience is incongruent with Rock Meadow’s value as a treasured [READ MORE]

Cleaning Belmont’s Water Means More Work

Environment, May/June 2020, Newsletter, Sewers, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

May 032020

Cleaning Belmont's Water Means More Work

By Anne-Marie Lambert There is good news and bad news in Belmont’s January 31 Report on Compliance to the EPA. On the one hand, the town decided to go ahead and reline or replace many sewer laterals and rehabilitate significant sections of the sewer system in certain Belmont neighborhoods as part of a comprehensive construction project planned for spring 2020. On the other hand, the report indicates that while there was a lot of investigation work (dye testing and sampling) and design work between July 2019 and January 2020, there was no significant mitigation work during the fall construction season. [READ MORE]

Belmont Tackles Climate Vulnerability Planning

Environment, May/June 2020, Newsletter, Open Space, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

May 032020

Belmont Tackles Climate Vulnerability Planning

By Catherine Bowen Take Belmont’s municipal vulnerability survey now. How is Belmont preparing for the impacts of climate change? As we are in the midst of a public health crisis, we are seeing the vulnerabilities and strengths of our community similarly to how we may experience them in a climate-change related crisis. It is timely that Belmont is now in the first phase of the Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness Program (MVP), a tool Massachusetts created in 2017 to enable local governments to prepare for the weather-related impacts of climate change and address vulnerabilities, including emergency communications. Modeled on the state’s Green [READ MORE]

Arlington Group Opposes Mugar Site Plans

Construction and Housing, Environment, March/April 2020, Newsletter, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Mar 022020

Arlington Group Opposes Mugar Site Plans

By Meg Muckenhoupt The Mugar wetlands are 17.7 acres of open land in East Arlington. Oaktree Development has proposed constructing a 207-unit apartment complex and six duplex townhouses on this site, to be renamed Thorndike Place. The Coalition to Save the Mugar Wetlands opposes building on the site, which is bordered by Route 2, Thorndike Field, and Dorothy, Edith, and Burch Streets. The following interview with Clarissa Rowe, one of the founders of the Coalition to Save the Mugar Wetlands, was edited for length and clarity. Why is the Mugar site important? I think the reason Arlington and Belmont residents [READ MORE]

Letter to the Editor: Clay Pit Pond

Environment, January 2020, Newsletter, Open Space, Plants, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Jan 062020

To the Editor: As a neighbor, fan, and defender of poor Clay Pit Pond, I especially enjoyed the recent article (“Clay Pit Pond Progresses from Eyesore to Asset,” Belmont Citizens Forum Newsletter, November/December 2019). I would like to add a few more details on the recent history of the pond. When we moved to Belmont in the fall of 1974 there was a shopping cart in the pond by the inlet and advertisements about the upcoming Kiwanis Fishing Derby. I found the cart and derby in great contrast. Apparently the pond was regularly stocked for the event. No one noticed [READ MORE]

20 Years of Belmont Water Trouble

Environment, January 2020, Newsletter, Open Space, Sewers, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Jan 062020

By Sumner Brown Belmont has two types of water trouble. One is flooding during heavy rains. The other trouble comes from leaking sewer pipes. Flooding Today, as I write this, there is no flooding in Belmont. Floods are rare enough that we do not make ourselves perpetually anxious about them, but parts of Belmont are vulnerable. In both Belmont and Arlington, people live in what were swamps, and there seem to be 100-year storms every 10 years. Climate change may have something to do with this. The Belmont Citizens Forum advocates for rain gardens and other measures to slow the [READ MORE]

Clay Pit Pond Progresses from Eyesore to Asset

Environment, Historic Preservation, History, Newsletter, November 2019, Open Space, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Nov 042019

Clay Pit Pond Progresses from Eyesore to Asset

By Michael Chesson Clay Pit Pond on Concord Avenue was once the site of Belmont’s largest industrial enterprise, a brickyard run by John H. and Robert A. Parry. The brothers bought 20¾ acres of land in 1888 on Concord Avenue and Underwood Street, with its valuable blue clay that turned an attractive reddish color when fired, and their yard produced 200,000 bricks a week. Just as the oil, steel, and railroad industries consolidated, the Parry brothers’ business in 1900 merged with the New England Brick Company, which owned three dozen other brickyards in the region. The firm installed new dryers, [READ MORE]

Belmont’s Underground Pollution Problem

Environment, Newsletter, November 2019, Sewers, Stormwater, Water Quality Comments Off

Nov 042019

By Anne-Marie Lambert If only the 504 gallons of household wastewater which had been pouring into Wellington Brook and Winn’s Brook through underground culverts every day had been more visible, perhaps we as a town would have addressed the necessary repairs more urgently. That’s what Belmont did when a student noticed an oil spill leaking into Clay Pit Pond during a freeze on December 12, 2003. A ruptured return line to the underground storage tank at Mary Lee Burbank Elementary school travelled through the town’s storm drain system carrying 1,000 gallons of oil to Clay Pit Pond. Alerted to the [READ MORE]

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