St. George Rainway: From Vision to Vibrant Community Space

The St. George Rainway in Vancouver is a wonderful fusion of community-driven initiatives and innovative urban design. What began as a vision to transform an underutilised space into a vibrant corridor has evolved into a dynamic area that enhances both the environment and the local community.

The St. George Rainway was first envisioned by a group of community volunteers who wanted to bring nature back into the streetscape while creating opportunities for artistic expression, education activities, and community gathering. In 2020, City of Vancouver began public consultation to make this project a reality. What they came up with was the Rainway

The Rainway as designed to use green rainwater infrastructure to:

Reduce street flooding
Treat rainwater pollutants from roadways
Reduce combined sewer overflows into local waterways
Enhance climate resiliency
Increase biodiversity
Cool the neighbourhood during summer heat

The project was also designed to provide safety and comfort improvements for those who walk, bike and roll down St. George Street.

Fast forward to today, and the St. George Rainway has blossomed into a green corridor that stretches approximately 1.5 kilometers. It features a unique blend of art, ecology, and community interaction. The project includes a series of bioswales – landscape elements designed to manage stormwater runoff – alongside lush planting beds, trees, and rain gardens that not only beautify the area but also improve local air quality and support wildlife habitats. It’s also an experience too. Art installations from local artists dot the pathway, turning everyday strolls into a cultural exploration. Benches, picnic areas, and play zones have been integrated, making it a perfect spot for families, joggers, and cyclists alike.

One of the best parts of the St. George Rainway is its strong community involvement. Local residents participated in workshops and design meetings, helping shape the vision and ensuring the project reflected the needs and desires of the neighbourhood. This collaboration has fostered a sense of ownership and pride among community members, who now see the Rainway as a vital part of their daily lives.

Just three weeks after being completed, the Rainway faced a true test with a record-breaking atmospheric river that brought over 100mm of rain to Metro Vancouver. The plants survived, and the water flowed gracefully over the weirs, demonstrating the effectiveness of the design.

The St. George Rainway is a model for other urban areas seeking to balance development with environmental stewardship and community well-being. This project demonstrates how thoughtful design can create multifunctional spaces that serve ecological, social, and recreational needs.

Future plans for the Rainway include potential expansions, with a focus on continuing to engage the community in its evolution. City of Vancouver is running a citizen science campaign using iNaturalist to measure biodiversity along the Rainway. You can learn more by visiting this citizen science page. The City of Vancouver wants to quantify the changes in biodiversity along the St. George Rainway by measuring species before and after the Rainway is built. You can see the current state of biodiversity on the Rainway and a series of recommendations in this report: https://syc.vancouver.ca/projects/st-george-rainway/st-george-rainawy-2022-bioblitz-report-back.pdf

Rainway - plants and physical barriers to slow water down the street

Volunteers planting plants into the rainway

Local residents gathered under a tree to hear City representatives talk about the project.

Local residents lined up, listening to organisers speaking about the project

You can find lots more info on these link:https://www.rainway.ca/ – https://www.shapeyourcity.ca/st-george-rainway

Note:

This post was created in #WordPress and can be viewed in the #Fedivers at: @owgf.org@owgf.org

OWGF has a Fediverse companion profile at: https://mastodon.world/@OWGF

OWGF is also on #Pixelfed here: https://pixelfed.social/OWGFhttps://pixelfed.social/OW

One response to “St. George Rainway: From Vision to Vibrant Community Space”

Bioplhilia and the need to fill our cities with nature. – Our Wonderful Green Future

Jul 26, 2025 at 9:13 pm

[…] It’s 2025, and it is long past time that everyone in our cities had the same access to greenery that the wealthiest residents enjoy. Yes, there is a cost to this, but there is an even greater human health cost for those living in nature-deprived spaces. Fortunately, there are ways to achieve greening objectives more quickly, more cheaply, and more easily through participatory urbanism—by inviting people to shape their own streets and giving residents who want to get hands-on a way to do so, as Emma Cutting has done with her Pollinators Corridor project. [Link]All over the world we are seeing citizen De-paving movements springing up. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depaving] Where local residents go out into the community and looking for opportunities to rip out hard surfaces and replacing them with nature. There are groups all over the world, from Portland to Berlin now doing this. Once the paving has gone they plant trees and bushes and return a little more space back to nature. De-paving also allows for opportunities to bringing back natural hydrological systems that capture stormwater run off. De-paving projects often include Sustainable Urban Stormwater Design. (SuSD) This is an approach to managing rainwater and runoff in urban areas that prioritises environmental sustainability, aiming to mimic natural hydrological processes to reduce pollution, improve water quality, and enhance urban resilience. I wrote about a project like this [HERE] […]

LikeLike