Rain – lots of it – and a faulty drainage system doomed a colorful rain garden outside of Hinsdale Central High School.
The district planted the native plants in front of the school last year to create a lush oasis at the main entrance. The gently sloped bioswales were intended to convey runoff water and were filled with native plants including white prairie clover, butterfly weed, and ornamental onion. The native plants were intended to not just be pretty, but to filter silt and pollutants from the runoff water.
But those plants and others died when the drainage system did not drain fast enough particularly after intense rains in April. Weeds, instead, have grown in their place.
“It flooded out the bottom and choked out the plants,” said Rick Young, an architect with Perkins + Will, the firm that devised the plans for the gardens at Hinsdale Central and at Hinsdale South high schools. The firm serves as the architect for Hinsdale Township High School District 86.
The district had been looking at a cost of about $35,000 to fix the garden’s drainage system, a sum that would have covered an extensive French-style drain, additional stone, excavating 24 to 36-inches deep, and geotextile to cover the stone. The sum has outraged board vice president Ed Corcoran.
“I don’t believe the taxpayer should pay for these mistakes,” he said.
Now, district officials say they think they can fix the drainage problem at a lower, through yet undetermined, cost.
“There are other ways we think we can remediate the problems we’re having with the drainage,” said Acting Superintendent Bruce Law.
Young said several less-costly solutions being considered for the garden that sits atop a drainage system include lowering grates of catch basins, building a less-extensive French-style drain that is covered with stone and re-directs water away from an area, or digging in areas over the under drains and filling them in with stone.
“It would allow the water to percolate through the stone rather than the through the soil,” Young said of the last solution. He said the problem, which is mostly on the east side of the school’s main entrance, may be addressed by one of the solutions, a combination of some or all of them.
The gardens were planted in 2012 after the board approved spending $237,000 on landscaping at the schools as part of a larger $17.9 project that included reconstructing the entrances at both schools. The gardens also have signs and were intended as a tool to help teach students about sustainability and other topics.
While the gardens at Hinsdale Central foundered, the ones at Hinsdale South, which are planted in beds that are not as deep, have flourished. Young said the Village of Hinsdale required Perkins + Will to change the plans at Central.
Some of the plants that died are covered by a warranty; others are not.
“We have to decide who’s going to be responsible for the plantings because all of them have died,” Law said.
The gardens were planted by Allied Landscaping Corp. Another firm, Gilbane Building Co., oversees construction for the district.
Young said it will be up to the district to decide how to move forward with replanting the garden. He said using less mature two-inch plugs rather than four-inch pots would be less expensive, but would not have the immediate visual impact. The garden can be replanted in the fall or spring, he said. Who will cover the cost of replanting the garden also has not yet been determined.
amannion@tribune.com
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