The South Los Angeles Wetlands Park (Courtesy KCET Departures. Photo by Justin Cram)
Sure enough "They paved paradise and put up a parking lot," as Joni Mitchell sang, but now one parking lot is going back to the birds and bees. An abandoned bus lot in south Los Angeles is now an urban wetland.
By cracking the concrete shell that encases L.A., the South Los Angeles Wetlands Park provides a natural filter for storm water run off from the city, reported KCET's Departures, a Californian community television station.
Wetlands are the planet's kidneys. Plants, bacteria and other creatures filter the water, but developers paved over L.A.'s wetlands as the city boomed. Now, the infrequent rains in Southern California turn into a toxic tea as they wash the accumulated oil, gas, and other pollutants off the streets into the watershed and eventually the ocean.
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The new park will trap some of the runoff and give organisms a chance to break down the pollutants. An underground catchment pipe filters out garbage like plastic bottles, as well as oil. Nature takes care of the rest of the contaminants.
The nine-acre park will not only help clean up L.A.'s environment, but also provide green space in an area largely bereft of nature. The park opened to the public earlier this month. The $26 million price tag on the park was partly paid by a 2004 settlement against Los Angeles, which cited the city for violations of the Clean Water Act, reported the National Resource Defense Council.
The urban wetland doesn't look like much more than a mud-ringed pool right now.
"But in a few years," City Councilwoman Jan Perry told the Los Angeles Times, "it will look like it's been here forever."
South Los Angeles Wetlands Park is the second urban aquatic ecosystem in the city. About one mile away, the Augustus F. Hawkins Wetlands Park's eight acres are now home to verdant plant life, turtles, and even egrets.
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For local children, the park will provide a connection to nature and a chance to witness an ecosystem in action, though it meant the loss of a place to play soccer.
"Birds need a place to play, too" a fourth-grader told KCET.
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The South Los Angeles Wetlands Park (Courtesy KCET Departures. Photo by Justin Cram)
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