Background

The Towar Gardens area is one of the oldest inhabited areas in Meridian Township, Ingham County, dating back to the mid-1800s. It was aptly named, for it ocne was an area of low-lying, rich agricultural land made productive in part by an historic and ambitious extensive network of canals dug in the mid-to-late 1800s and early 1900s to drain a 7000-acre marsh known as the Chandler Marsh (“the Big Marsh”). This network of canals later was to become the basis of the Remy Chandler Intercounty Drain system that outlets water, including that from the Towar Gardens area, to the Looking Glass River north in Clinton County.

Today, Towar Gardens is almost exclusively residential land use, with over 400 platted single-family homes and several multi-family apartment and condominium developments. This approximately 200-acre area is nearly built-out, with the majority of dwellings having been constructed either during the 1920s to the 1940s, or in the 1980s. A portion of the area is now located in the City of East Lansing as a result of a 425 Agreement. Due to the modest size of the homes and lots within this neighborhood, it is considered to be one of the most affordable housing opportunities in the two affluent communities in which it is located.

Despite the formal platting of most of the land and its unique history connecting it to a massive, turn-of-the-century drainage project, the drainage system in Towar Gardens has remained inadequate in size, type, and condition to accommodate the changes in runoff that have accompanied the shift over time from agricultural to residential land use. The lack of an adequate collector system as well as the lack of a connection to proper outlets in the Remy Chandler Intercounty Drain system, combined with site constraints such as the low-lying, level topography and poorly-drained soils, have resulted in a long history of widespread and frequent flooding even after only minor rainfall events of less than one-year storms. After such events, there has occurred localized ponding of water for days and sometimes even for weeks. Roads have been in poor repair due to saturated sub-bases and it has not been uncommon for sump-pumps in homes to run constantly, simply re-circulating the water from basements to yard discharge and then back into foundation drains. Illegal connections of sump pumps to the sanitary system (the only real outlet available) and inflow and infiltration have resulted in a history of sewer back-ups. Resident complaints have been frequent and long-standing over loss of private property and unhealthy conditions from the stagnant, ponded water.

A drainage survey conducted in 2003 by the Ingham County Drain Commissioner (ICDC) and Meridian Township to accurately assess the extent of the existing inflow and infiltration problems, indicated that 64% of Towar Gardens residents had surface drainage problems, with 13.5 % reporting basement flooding or sanitary sewer back-ups within the last few years. Rain events recorded during the spring and summer by the survey team verified the widespread flooding that was reported. It was not uncommon in some areas within Towar Gardens for the backyard flooding to last for several days after even 30-minute rainfall events. Previous studies of the neighborhood, although not as comprehensive, had documented similar findings.

Despite the long-standing and well-documented problems, practical affordable solutions had always been lacking due to the high cost to retrofit an adequate drainage system into such a large built-out modest neighborhood with as many site challenges as Towar Gardens. The site challenges included the essentially flat and low-lying topography; the downstream outlet elevations in the Remy Chandler Intercounty Branch Drains that limited options for the collection and conveyance by gravity; the lack of available land for construction of required detention facilities without condemnation and removal of needed affordable housing stock; the multiple utility conflicts with adding pipes and other drainage infrastructure in an older neighborhood; the necessary compliance with permitting requirements of Phase II of the Clean Water Act and Parts 301 and 303 of PA 451 of 1994, as well as Remy Chandler Intercounty Drain discharge standards; locally high water table and poorly-drained soils; and the impact of construction’s massive disruption to the daily lives of the hundreds of residents in Towar Gardens and the thousands who use this neighborhood’s streets.

But in 2003, a series of wet years with persistent sewage back-ups and monitoring data that showed that on rain event days, flow exceeded 1.0 MGD (with non-rain event days averaging .35 MGD) heightened concerns of Township Public Works officials about sanitary sewer capacity. These concerns, reinforced by the longstanding complaints of landowners, including some who literally could not use their land at all due to flooding, led the Meridian Township Board to petition the Ingham County Drain Commissioner for drainage improvements to the Towar Gardens neighborhood. For the portion of lands within the neighborhood that never had any public drain system and that drained to the west to the Remy Chandler Intercounty Branch #2 Drain, petitions were filed under Chapters 3 and 4 to lay out and designate a drainage district and to locate, establish, and construct a drain, respectively. For the remaining Towar Gardens lands which had been served, albeit inadequately, by five public drains and which drained to the east and north to the Remy Chandler Intercounty Branch #3 Drain, petitions were filed under Chapters 19 and 8, to consolidate the existing drainage districts and to make the necessary improvements to the newly consolidated drain, respectively.

At the Boards of Determination, the close-knit nature of the neighborhood became very apparent.

Residents who did not have flooding on their property, rather than arguing against the project as is typical, argued for it, testifying that, for example, their mother or cousin who lived two streets over had standing water that needed to be corrected. And even where there was no familial relationship, there was a strong sense conveyed at the hearings that the people in Towar Gardens truly felt like they were part of a neighborhood and that the neighborhood needed to be improved. This strong sense of community was tangibly expressed through a neighborhood group, TC3 (Towar Community Concerns Committee) that was very supportive of the drain project. As community leaders, their support and involvement early on during the surveying of the neighborhood (there was an almost unheard of 83.5% participation), as well as during the hearings and early scope meetings, and later during construction, contributed greatly to the overall success and acceptance of the project. The one comment heard most at the hearings of necessity, other than the great need for the project, was the concern about preserving the vegetation (mature trees) that gave character to the neighborhood. All petitions were found necessary.

Based on hearing testimony, the drainage survey, and a review of the site challenges facing the project, it became very clear to the Ingham County Drain Commissioner and project engineers, Fitzgerald Henne & Associates, Inc., that a different approach other than the typical pond and pipe approach would need to be taken. The design team focused on a low impact design using a combination of soft and hard engineering that could provide a cost-effective solution to the flooding given the many site challenges, and could do so while also fulfilling the environmental goals of the Ingham County Drain Commissioner, as well as the legal requirements for the quality of the stormwater discharge to the downstream waters.

The two drains of the Towar Rain Garden Drains (TRGD), the Towar Gardens and Branches Drain (TG&BD) and the Towar Snell Drain (TSD), were designed using the same low impact approach and were constructed simultaneously. In a nut-shell, traditional concrete drain pipes primarily were used as the conveyance system and underdrained rain gardens and roadside ditches primarily were used as the collection system. A new drainage system was constructed for the entire 200-acre neighborhood, with 6.75 miles of drain, including 5.0 acres of rain gardens, constructed for the TG&BD, and 1.5 miles of drain, including 0.62 acres of rain gardens, constructed for the TSD. Every lot was provided a sump lead. Construction of the TRGD was a massive undertaking, with every road in the neighborhood torn up at some point and nearly every property impacted by construction of a rain garden, ditch, and /or pipe. The project costs for the TG&BD was $7,805,000 and for the TSD was $2,010,000. The TRGD project is the largest low impact, urban retrofit drain project constructed under the Drain Code.