Bioswales, trenches or channels that resemble flower beds, are green infrastructure technology that manage stormwater runoff and promote environmental health. They beautify areas, play host to pollinators and prevent pollutants from entering waterways.

Now, after a bit of advocacy from Eva Montane, professional landscaper and president of Columbine Landscapes Co., the city of Durango is implementing bioswales at Schneider Park, where six pickleball courts are under construction.

At a City Council meeting in September, Mayor Melissa Youssef said she spoke with Montane, who suggested the city try to minimize nonfunctional turf – lawn grass and barren streetscapes – and instead focus on making “eco-friendly landscapes, including bioswales.”

“She really wanted to encourage us to implement this type of strategy in our new parks,” Youssef said. “So we followed up, and lo and behold, we are doing this at Schneider Park.”

Montane said she could talk about bioswales for days.

“What I think is so exciting about bioswales is that they are so good for a healthy environment, which is good for humans and all the other critters,” she said.

Bioswales are often placed where there would otherwise be pavement or lawn grass, neither of which are environmentally friendly or aesthetically pleasing, she said. But bioswales filter stormwater, which can carry pollutants if it’s the area’s first rain in a while. Those pollutants sink into the soil of the bioswale where they are naturally broken down by microbial activity.

Bioswales are typically planted with native plants or plants adapted to the area, supporting pollinators like bees, butterflies and hummingbirds and inserting rich biodiversity into public spaces.

“And so we’re interacting with hummingbirds and hummingbird moths and butterflies and all of these things that usually make people happy and feel good,” she said. “ ... There’s scientific evidence that humans benefit from all of these things.”

That positive feeling of interacting with nature is called biophilia, she said. The phenomenon describes “how humans resonate deeply with nature.”

“The more we can have people connecting with this richer form of nature that bioswales provide us, the more humans have a greater sense of well-being, greater focus, greater creativity, less stress,” she said. “There’s just so many benefits. It’s so exciting.”

cburney@durangoherald.com