CNU's Rainwater-in-Context Initiative

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CNU's new website for the Rainwater-in-Context Initiative works to institute rainwater management practices that strengthen and fully complement New Urbanism at all scales. The benefits behind dense, walkable urbanism - as promoted in the Charter -  are enhanced by high-performance rainwater solutions that are skillfully coordinated.

In recent years, interest in green infrastructure and low-impact design has grown as solutions to harmonize the built and natural environments.  Yet, current rainwater management practices tend to focus on individual sites and ignore the impacts rainwater has at the watershed scale. Current approaches that require more water to be detained or infiltrated on-site encourage sprawl and make it harder to create infill developments and build compact urbanism. Through our initiative work, CNU has worked with local, state, and federal EPA officials to improve existing and  proposed regulations and has commented on rainwater credits in the LEED-ND rating system.

As water access and quality issues become more severe worldwide, governments will be obliged to re-examine the way they manage water resources within their jurisdictions. When regulations change, the Congress for the New Urbanism hopes that the tenets of its Rainwater-in-Context Initiative will be given central consideration and priority.

For more information about this initiative contact Caitlin Ghoshal at cghoshal@cnu.org.