Stewardship

Vision

“...the responsible use and protection of the natural environment through conservation and sustainable practices to enhance ecosystem resilience and human well-being” 7

4

Create a symbiotic relationship between human and natural systems

Mitigate flooding along the guts

Increase public access to the guts for community space

Case Study: Copenhagen Cloudburst Formula

After Copenhagen’s 2011 cloudburst, a major rain event that left $1 billion in damages, the city strategized new ways to address climate change and floodable development. As a part of this project they identified the cost of doing nothing as $60 million a year, and publicized the effects of climate change to the public. The result was has been that the city as a whole has rallied to the challenge of tackling increased rainfall and become a city focused on stewardship.8

Case Study: Rotterdam Waterplein

Completed in 2013, Rotterdam’s Waterplein is a series of three public plazas designed to collect water during storm events. The plazas act as pools that will fill up with water and then release it when the city’s drainage systems have more capacity. This project combines community space and hard infrastructure in a costeffective way that brings more awareness of water management and creates a better public realm.9

To make this investigation of the guts more tangible, we chose to identify a gut to use as a pilot. By studying a specific gut, we can conduct analysis of specific conditions occurring in the guts today, and provide recommendations that can be applied to the island at large in the future.

Intervention Need Index

We started by identifying factors that would help us find a gut to use for this pilot. We looked for vulnerable areas where intervention and improvements in the gut would provide the most benefit to the community. Social vulnerability, population density, and flooding were the key factors that we chose. These factors indicate areas where people are more susceptible to the hazards that guts can create. We combined these factors into an Intervention Need Index and were able to see areas where new management strategies for the guts the most necessary.

Data: 2010 Decennial Census of Island Areas, UVI

Based on the Intervention Need Index, we identified three areas where gut interventions could provide a benefit to vulnerable populations. These areas included some of the most dense, vulnerable, and flood prone estates.

Christiansted has a large socially vulnerable population, and the diverse urban conditions create unique challenges as the gut moves to the sea.

Williams Delight

As of the most dense and socially vulnerable estates in St. Croix, Williams Delight is especially vulnerable to intense storms and flooding.

Of these three key areas, we chose to look further at Christiansted, as there was a larger population to serve, greater availability of publicly owned land, and diverse conditions that provided a good breadth of challenges for the pilot to address.

Directly adjacent to the closed refinery, Bethlehem’s watershed faces issues of environmental justice for nearby neighborhoods.