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Louisville, situated in the notoriousOhio Valley, is historically plauged by the unpredictable whims ofmother nature.
Snow flurries in June and heat waves inFebruary, sleet storms in September and dry spells in April are allnot that unusual. But, among other things, the peculiar weatherpatterns in this town are often marked by the rain.
Sure, it sprinkles now and then, butmuch more often when it rains it pours. And all that fallen watercan be hard to manage, especially when drainage systems areinadequate.
After several years of complaints abpoutpoling water after heavy raiind, Physiacal plant crew are hard atwork on a
The University of Louisville PhysicalPlant is undertaking a major project to fix several key areasaround the Belknap Campus where drainage is poor.
The project began with talks betweenStudent Government Association Services Vice President JustinMorehead and U of L Vice President for Finance and AdministrationLarry Owsley.
The two began by pinpointing the sourcesof the drainage problems, and then developed a plan and time framefor addressing the areas that were identified for improvement.
When problems were identified, however,Morehead said that even certain high-priority areas”weren’t addressed immediately,” since it tooktime to determine the underlying cause of poor drainage in certainareas.
However, Owsley says his office isworking as efficiently as possible to make needed repairs.
“We’ve tried to be responsive and react to the …problem,” said Owsley, who, along with Morehead and U of LAssociate Vice President for Facilities Larry Detherage, hasdeveloped a “blueprint” of the campus that showspriority areas which Physical Plant crews are or will befixing.
“So far, we’ve pinpointed 42problem areas …” Owsley explained, “with the SACramp being one of the highest-priority areas.” In addition tothe SAC ramp, Owsley identified several other areas that have beenmarked as problem spots, including certain areas between theInterfaith Center and the Baptist Campus Ministry building.
According to both Owsley and Morehead, thestrategy for fixing problem areas seems to be two-fold.
The more long-term aspect of the projectentails Physical Plant crews moving from the south side of campusnear Eastern Parkway toward the north side of campus near CardinalBoulevard.The crews will use the blueprint to correct problems asthey come to them, eventually hitting all the target areas as theywork. According to Morehead, many of the areas south of the SAChave been fixed already.
More immediately, explained Detherageand Owsley, crews are and have been working to fix the severalhigh-priority areas, including previously mentioned sites like theSAC ramp and the Stevenson Hall lawn.
And, indeed, a simple stroll acrosscampus reveals evidence of improvements in these places.
“If you look,” said Detherage as hestood in front of Stevenson Hall, “you can see where [we] putin catch basins here and by the [SAC] ramp.”
He also explained that crews changed theslope of the ground in areas around the Interfaith Center toalleviate pooling water and improve natural run-off.
Workers are also replacing areas of crackedconcrete which allow water to pool from beneath, and areas wherethe ground has shifted and disturbed the natural or ideal flow ofwater during rainstorms.
Some of these areas where poor drainage hasbeen blamed on that shifting include the many construction sitesacross campus where development is underway.
Digging in and grating of the ground toprepare for new structures can indeed cause ground-shifting, butOwsley says that not much can be done about this until constructionis complete.
However, some areas with drainage problems will be fixed in tandemwith construction and improvements that are planned for the nearfuture.
Parkway Field on the south side of OldEastern Parkway is often a mucky mess after even moderate rain, butOwsley says that plans are in the works to dry up this area aswell.
“We’re turning that area intointramural fields,” he said, “and we’ll fix the[drainage] problems when we do that.”
And, indeed, all of these plans to improvethe campus drainage situation are welcome ideas for those whoventure across University terrain between classes each day.
Several students and staff members notedthe improvements that have already been made and look forward toseeing more dry land to come.
Naturally, though, available funding to fixdrainage problems will only stretch so far. Owsley said thatPhysical Plant is doing as much as it can with money from itsbudget. He said that state funding has also helped to push theproject as far as it has come.
The Student Government Association, theorganization responsible for the push to improve the drainage, hasnot, however, contributed any funding to the project.
“We really didn’t want to useSGA money on something the state should pay for,” Moreheadexplained.
And while Owsley says that any moneycontributed to the project, including SGA funding, would be put togood use to improve areas that have not yet been addressed,Morehead was unsure of the possibility of SGA donating any fundingto Physical Plant’s efforts in the future.
Nevertheless, in light of other projects, like the new onlinevoting system on which SGA has spent about $5,000 of student money,some students seem less than pleased to know that more money couldbe spent to improve the drainage problems.
“Online voting is ridiculous in myopinion,” said 18-year-old Nursing major Meagan Owen.”I’d rather keep my shoes and the bottoms of my jeansin good shape than have online voting.”
Jetona Smith, 19, agreed with Owen. She thinks that the Universityand SGA should stick to the traditional polling booths, saying,”If you want to get out and vote, you can go out and do it. Ithink money should be spent on something like fixing these drainageproblems, that affects more people.”
But regardless of how thedrainage-improvement projects are funded, most people across campusagree that they are much-needed and are glad that the University isfinally doing something about the pooling water and mucky mess thathave troubled the school for so long.
