Reducing Runoff Through Rain Gardening

Looking for ways to green your property without investing a lot of money? Rain gardens are great, small projects that can be added as an enhancement to almost any property.

Rain gardens are planted depressions that allow stormwater runoff from impervious urban areas like roofs, driveways, walkways, parking lots, and compacted lawn areas the opportunity to be absorbed into the ground instead of flowing into storm drains. The purpose of a rain garden is usually to improve water quality in nearby bodies of water, and they do this by cutting down on the amount of pollution reaching creeks and streams by up to 30%.

Because they reduce the amount of surface water on your property, rain gardens are also an effective way to help control erosion and flooding on commercial properties. Rain gardens can be installed on any low spot on your property, and can be designed to look as informal or as formal as you like.

Here in the Mid-Atlantic region, rain gardening is a common technique used to mitigate pollution in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus, which would otherwise contribute to algae blooms and other problems in the Bay, are instead put to beneficial use when taken up by the plants in the garden.

E-Landscape has experience designing and installing rain gardens on a number of commercial properties in our area. For more information on adding a rain garden to your property, contact us at 410-798-4224.