Your Idlewood Greenway, your watershed

Connecting the stormwater storage facility within the Greenway

We are adding an underground stormwater storage facility to Idlewood Greenway. This is part of a larger project to build climate change resilience and improve water quality in Kitchener creeks. The trail through Idlewood Greenway will also be upgraded as part of this project.

The project team wants to understand how you use Idlewood Greenway and what’s important to your experience. Knowing this will help us to plan for construction. Your feedback will also help us decide how to replant the surface over the underground stormwater storage facility.

Construction is expected to begin in 2028 and is estimated to be completed by 2029.

Background

In 2016, the City of Kitchener completed an Integrated Stormwater Management Master Plan. This plan created a strategy to manage stormwater for the next 15 years. Through this plan, we learned that only 25% of runoff in the city is managed through stormwater facilities. This means 75% of runoff from heavy rainfall and snow melt flows into storm sewers, washing pollutants into local creeks.

Through the 2016 plan, we identified Idlewood Greenway as a place to add an underground stormwater storage facility to collect runoff. This will help to:

• Improve water quality in Idlewood Creek and the Grand River;

• Reduce the risk of flooding;

• Reduce erosion in Idlewood Creek;

• Improve resilience against climate change; and

• Enhance community safety.