Challenges in Reusing Vacant Residential Land in Legacy Cities for Green Stormwater Infrastructure: The Cases of Detroit and Cleveland

Abstract

Legacy city plans prescribe reusing vacant residential land for green uses that improve quality of life and strengthen neighborhoods. To reduce combined sewer overflows, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency required green stormwater infrastructure (GSI), a possible reuse of vacant land consistent with those plans. Case studies of two cities, based on interviews, meetings, and government documents, revealed that GSI rarely reused vacant land because goals of mayors, sewer agencies, and neighborhood advocates were incompatible; reforms to facilitate GSI emphasized development sites; and no measures protected GSI from destruction. Nonprofit organizations will likely lead efforts to install GSI on vacant residential land at smaller scale.

Keywords

green infrastructure land use legacy city neighborhood development vacant land

Introduction

Urban planners in several cities have developed plans that accept that the population has declined substantially and may continue to do so before stabilizing and perhaps growing (e.g., City of Flint 2013; City of Saginaw 2011; City of Youngstown 2005; Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative [CUDC] 2008; Detroit Works Project Long-Term Planning Steering Committee 2012). Departing from previous plans that prescribed redevelopment and assumed growth, these plans proposed using vacant land for ecological uses, economic development zones that depend on ecological processes, and spacious residential areas. City leaders and residents could imagine less dense land uses to improve quality of life and make neighborhoods more attractive without necessarily reversing decades-long population decline. These plans raise questions, however, about whether and how such land use transformation can occur in weak property markets.

This research analyzes the implementation of such land use transition by considering one reuse the plans advocate—green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) on vacant residential land in two cities, Cleveland and Detroit, that serve as case studies. GSI refers to systems that “use plant or soil systems, permeable pavement or other permeable surfaces or substrates, stormwater harvest and reuse, or landscaping to store, infiltrate, or evapotranspirate stormwater and reduce flows to sewer systems or to surface waters” (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency [EPA] 2021). GSI can produce co-benefits including improved health due to less air pollution, flooding, and heat island effects; more attractive neighborhoods; a sense of safety; incentives for physical activity; new jobs; and higher property values (Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; U.S. EPA 2022). This reuse of vacant residential land seems promising because U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations push for GSI to reduce combined sewer overflows (CSOs), and many neighborhood organizations see GSI as enhancing neighborhoods and benefiting residents (Albro 2019; Chaffin et al. 2016; Heckert and Rosan 2016). Perhaps these pressures could help realize the plans’ prescriptions for widespread reuse of land for GSI in ways that would enhance quality of life.

The question, however, is how land use can transition from deteriorated structure or vacant lot to the positive, greener future in uses such as GSI. Private demand for property often drives land use toward the “highest and best use” in real estate markets. The returns from redevelopment to more intensive uses, often serving those who can pay higher prices and rents, exceed current returns enough to compensate for costs of the land use shift (DiPasquale and Wheaton 1996; Peiser and Hamilton 2012; Smith 1979). In cities that have lost substantial shares of their peak population, private real estate demand is so weak in many neighborhoods that market forces do not lead to an alternative use and vacant lots predominate, often becoming overgrown sites for illegal dumping (Bonham, Spilka, and Rastorfer 2002; Hollander et al. 2009). When externalities of reuse would benefit residents and their neighborhoods, public and nonprofit organization interventions may spur the transition to positive uses that plans envision, such as gardens, playlots, agriculture, stormwater management, expansion of residents’ side yards, and sustainable energy generation. Governments, quasi-governmental entities, and nonprofit organizations would lead in implementing projects.

Findings of this research, relying on government documents, interviews with key actors, and observations at meetings of several stakeholder groups, show that after initial projects, the sewer agencies in Cleveland and Detroit rarely installed GSI on vacant, unused, residential land, where the cities’ plans envisioned it. Nonprofit organizations continued to work on using GSI to improve vacant land, but they had small impact on the expanses of neglected property and faced many barriers. Making installation and maintenance of GSI routine and widespread on vacant, neglected land—and therefore advancing the vision of the city plans—faced three major hurdles: (1) mayors, sewer agencies, and residents had goals that did not align; (2) city departments’ reforms to enable more GSI eased difficulties in implementation but followed national models for cities experiencing considerable development and overlooked barriers to reusing vacant land; and (3) no systems or plans existed for sustaining GSI that enhanced neighborhoods. Therefore, few GSI projects improved residents’ quality of life and strengthened neighborhoods; sewer agencies’ work became disconnected from social justice concerns about improving quality of life for residents of disinvested areas.

The next section addresses the issues facing legacy cities and reviews what is known, first, about reuse of vacant land in relation to such cities’ plans and, second, GSI’s use of vacant land. The article then describes the research design and findings.

Legacy Cities and Reuse of Vacant Land

“Legacy cities,” a label proposed at a meeting of the American Assembly in Detroit in 2011 (Mallach 2012), have lost substantial shares of their peak populations since the 1950s or 1960s due to suburbanization, white flight, and racial discrimination. “Legacy” refers to the assets such cities have from the era when they grew and prospered—infrastructure, arts establishments, major medical and educational institutions, and historic neighborhoods, for example. Legacy cities lost much of their employment due to suburbanization of businesses, regional industrial restructuring, international competition, and technological change. Decline brought low housing values, high vacancy rates, and continued disinvestment as the population became poorer. Demolition of deteriorated structures increased vacant land, which often became publicly owned due to tax foreclosure. The loss of property value reduced tax revenues and led to a search for new revenue sources and major cuts in public services. In most legacy cities, disproportionate numbers of African Americans experienced these conditions. African Americans had migrated to these cities to find good industrial jobs and to escape Jim Crow conditions in the South but then faced segregation, restrictions in moving to suburbs, and employment discrimination (Beauregard 2009, 2012; Dewar and Thomas 2013; Mallach 2012; Sugrue 2005).

For decades, city officials and urban planners continued to plan for growth and development even in neighborhoods where few structures remained (e.g., Bright 2003; Gittell 1992; Keating, Krumholz, and Star 1996; Stoker, Stone, and Worgs 2015). By the early twenty-first century, however, vacant structures and empty lots dominated neighborhoods, former commercial corridors, and industrial districts in many formerly prosperous cities, especially in the Midwest and Northeast. As city officials and residents acknowledged that these changes had profoundly altered their cities and that regaining dense development and industrial prosperity was unlikely, they considered ways to improve the quality of life without expecting growth and development. Although some areas of these cities would experience revitalization and increased demand for property, most would not. In some cities, the result was a legacy city plan.

Legacy city plans focus on how cities might provide good quality of life in the context of long-term population and employment decline with little redevelopment. The plans primarily consider land use and offer ideas for uses that do not require development. Although they provide maps that show possible futures, these are “framework” plans that suggest ways to reimagine cities’ land use without prescribing specifics (City of Flint 2013; City of Saginaw 2011; City of Youngstown 2005; CUDC 2008; Detroit Works Project Long-Term Planning Steering Committee 2012; LaFrambois, Park, and Yurcaba 2023).

Thinking about cities’ adaptation to “shrinkage” constitutes a major departure from urban planners’ principal focus on real estate development and growth (Dewar and Weber 2012; Hollander et al. 2009, 223–224), a “paradigm shift” (Mallach 2012, xvii; Wiechmann and Pallagst 2012, 262). As with any change in thinking, much remains to be learned about how chronically declining cities evolve and how this different perspective on urban planning may effect change. This paper focuses on reuse of vacant land rather than development because this constitutes the greatest departure from, and possibly the greatest challenge to, urban planning’s development-oriented way of working (Hollander et al. 2009, 227ff.).

Recurring questions around the legacy city plans ask how their ideas have been implemented and whether implementation improves quality of life (Hummel 2014; Mallach 2012; Rhodes and Russo 2013). No studies have considered the extent to which plans’ visions for GSI on vacant residential land have been realized. The little research on whether transition in the use of vacant land in legacy cities follows the plans’ prescriptions shows slow, uneven change. A year after Youngstown 2010, the first “shrinking city” plan (Lanks 2006), was completed, a small fraction of vacant, city-owned lots had been transferred to homeowners, even given the short time for implementation (City of Youngstown 2005; Rhodes and Russo 2013). Restrictive rules and pricing barriers kept side lot transfers low elsewhere, too (Dewar 2006; Ganning and Tighe 2015). By mid-2023, however, the Detroit Land Bank, for instance, had shown the potential of streamlining procedures and clarifying policies by selling more than twenty-two thousand vacant lots to adjacent owners over the previous nine years (Detroit Land Bank Authority [DLBA] 2023, 35).

An initiative to buy out scattered residents in a nearly vacant area and facilitate moves to denser neighborhoods had almost no takers in Youngstown, deterring removal of infrastructure (Rhodes and Russo 2013, 315). In 2013, Youngstown adopted a zoning code that partially conformed to the plan; but more than three-fourths of the area the plan had designated as future open space remained zoned as residential. The inconsistency with the zoning code signaled weak implementation. The revised code avoided changes that could be interpreted as takings of privately owned vacant lots. Residents did not support major zoning change even when they lived in high-vacancy areas (Ryan and Gao 2019, 439–440).

In Detroit, transfers of land for agriculture were few and slow, due to officials’ reluctance to commit to uses that could interfere with redevelopment and the uncertainty that caused farmers who needed to invest considerable labor and funds to prepare land for crops (Newell et al. 2022; Pothukuchi 2017). In Cleveland, community development institutions and city policies supported agriculture to reuse obsolete residential property, but city officials transferred public land for agriculture only for short periods, to preserve land for development (Coppola 2019; Pothukuchi 2018). Dewar and Linn (2015), looking in detail at a high-vacancy, four-square-mile Detroit neighborhood, showed that numerous property owners had informally taken over adjacent lots, frequently more than one, starting to create the spacious residential quality that plans envisioned. A small number of lots had become gardens—slightly more than one hundred out of about four thousand five hundred vacant lots.

In Flint, Morckel (2020) asserted that Flint lost an opportunity during its water crisis to restructure water infrastructure in response to a much smaller population and extensive vacant land. This stimulated strong opposition from others who argued such adjustment intensified environmental injustice (Sadler et al. 2021). Their debate reflected disagreement about how adjustment in land use should take place as well as calls for more socially just planning processes in any legacy city (Németh et al. 2020).

Reusing Vacant Land for GSI

Although legacy city plans promote GSI as one reuse of vacant land that can also enhance quality of life, its installation on such property has received little investigation in research on adoption of GSI. The regulatory pressures for GSI implementation in legacy cities, however, suggest using vacant land for GSI could be more promising than for other types of reuse, although past research does not look specifically at the reuse of vacant residential land. EPA’s 2007 memorandum encouraging GSI opened a “policy window” that allowed sewer authorities to include GSI to meet EPA requirements to reduce CSOs (Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018, 124). EPA’s regulation has served as a “driver” in encouraging state and federal leaders to make policy and coordinate initiatives for GSI (Harrington and Hsu 2018, 107). In Philadelphia, the legacy city with the strongest and earliest commitment to GSI, pilot programs, mayoral leadership, and a policy entrepreneur as director of the water department advanced adoption (Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018; Madden 2010; Mandarano 2011). Government practices became stronger with learning from experience (Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; Hsu, Lim, and Meng 2020).

With few exceptions, research on GSI implementation takes the perspective of addressing stormwater problems and does not examine reuse of vacant land to improve quality of life in neighborhoods. Studies that have included legacy cities and mentioned co-benefits find barriers have interfered with any use of GSI. Within city government, the challenges include conflicting perspectives on how to address stormwater, need for change in sewer departments to emphasize GSI, unclear codes and regulations, weak collaboration across departments, resistance to change, lack of consideration of public perspectives, and failure to commit to long-term maintenance. These challenges also handicapped the efforts of nonprofit organizations as they sought to implement GSI that residents supported. Neighborhood-oriented organizations wanted GSI to address social and environmental concerns (Albro 2019; Chaffin et al. 2016; Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; Keeley et al. 2013).

Studies of watershed and metro-wide programs and integrated urban water management in numerous countries imply challenges legacy cities might face in reusing vacant land for GSI, although such programs differ from GSI work and operate in quite different political and organizational contexts. An analysis of 53 studies concluded, for instance, that “barriers are largely socio-institutional”—political, social, legal, or managerial (Brown and Farrelly 2009, 839–840), though technical issues remain. A review of forty-four studies in Europe, Australia, and the United States concluded that sustainable stormwater management implementation was slow because of lack of standards, guidelines, funding, and land. Communication was poor among nongovernmental actors and local officials (Qiao, Kristoffersson, and Randrup 2018).

In sum, past research shows that implementation of any GSI in any city will initially face difficulties requiring time to resolve, as with any significant innovation (Rogers 2003). Unlike other cities, however, legacy cities have plentiful vacant land, much of it publicly owned, but austere fiscal circumstances, governments with reduced capacity, and populations too poor to bear major rate hikes for stormwater management. Past research leaves uncertainty in several ways about how legacy cities in particular might implement GSI where it could not only reduce CSOs but also transform neglected vacant land to enhance quality of life, as legacy city plans suggest. First, with a few exceptions, research does not distinguish between installation of GSI on vacant residential land and that connected to development even when examining a legacy city’s experience. Therefore, it does not clarify what specifically helps or hinders GSI installation on vacant residential land. Second, studies that include legacy cities have relied on a few interviews about GSI adoption without documenting types of projects the interviewees referenced, thus generalizing in ways that may not apply to vacant land reuse. Third, studies have examined a point in time, not showing whether progress occurred, or looked only at the leading innovator in use of GSI, Philadelphia. Literature that includes legacy cities’ GSI cites the need for research on “the integration of stormwater management and urban planning objectives” (Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018, 1106), “how local jurisdictions and policy entrepreneurs ‘convert’ federal policies into locally salient environmental programs” (Harrington and Hsu 2018, 114), and the challenge of “scaling up local vision and capacity to match the legal and environmental constraints” (Chaffin et al. 2016, 432). This need in research aligns with examination of how GSI implementation to address stormwater requirements connects to the reuse of vacant land to benefit residents.

This paper therefore shifts the focus from GSI implementation in general to tackle the question of what deters GSI installation on vacant residential land specifically despite the advantages of plentiful vacant land, citywide plans that recommended GSI to reuse such land to improve quality of life, EPA requirements and therefore funding, and the interest of nonprofit organizations and residents. The experience of two cities, Detroit and Cleveland, not leaders in implementing GSI, reveals hurdles and advantages many such cities might face in transforming vacant land; in Detroit, the research followed changes over time to take account of adaptation in response to learning from experience. The research can advance understanding of how government stormwater management relates to local planning goals and to non-governmental organizations’ work to strengthen disinvested neighborhoods. Knowledge about this experience can aid in advancing legacy-city planning from frameworks to specifics that have prospects for implementation.

Research Design and Methods

This research examined implementation of GSI on residential vacant land in neighborhoods by sewer agencies and nonprofit organizations in Cleveland from 2014 through 2016 and in Detroit from 2014 through mid-2020. In both cities, the projects were among the earliest and thus promised to reveal barriers and facilitators for installing GSI before system reforms occurred and nonprofit organizations learned from their efforts. The Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) installed GSI for bioretention on four vacant residential lots in 2015,¹ and nonprofits sited GSI on ten vacant lots in 2013 and approximately twenty more starting in 2015 (lists received from Greening of Detroit 2015; DWSD 2016b). In Cleveland, the research considered the Cleveland Botanical Garden’s installations in 2014 on three neighborhood vacant lots and the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District’s (NEORSD) GSI on four more in 2014–2015 (Albro 2019; NEORSD 2015) (Figure 1). Other installations on vacant residential land had been proposed but not yet implemented in both cities. Because the early experiences indicated rapidly evolving systems, the research followed Detroit’s GSI efforts through 2020 to learn how barriers to GSI on vacant land might be resolved.

Figure 1.

GSI on neighborhood vacant residential land. (A) DWSD and partners’ project, 2016. (B) Cleveland Botanical Garden’s project, 2015 (for maps and designs, see Albro (2019) and Nassauer et al. (2019)).

Cleveland and Detroit offer a useful comparison. The two cities have similar, weak demand for property so private market forces do not explain differences in their use of vacant residential land for GSI in ways that could provide co-benefits.² The cities resemble each other in additional ways that may influence the transition from obsolete land use to GSI. EPA has required GSI in both, though with different legal arrangements, explained below. Both cities have plans that envision the green reuse of large amounts of vacant residential land (CUDC 2008; Detroit Works Project 2012). The Cleveland City Planning Commission adopted Reimagining a More Sustainable Cleveland in 2008. Detroit officials have not endorsed Detroit Future City, but a nonprofit organization continues to advance the ideas about land use change. Both cities demolished many structures in the aftermath of the mortgage foreclosure crisis and recession, adding to already large amounts of vacant land, much of it publicly owned.³

The cities differ in ways that suggest Cleveland could be more successful than Detroit in implementing GSI on residential vacant land, given the importance of government and nonprofit organizations. Therefore, differences in the cases could point to promising practices that might lead to more GSI on vacant land in cities like these (R. K. Yin 2014, 56ff.). Previous research has noted that installation of GSI involves numerous governmental departments, and staff need to work together in unaccustomed ways; fragmentation of roles and difficulties working across agencies and organizations interfere with GSI implementation (Brown 2005; Brown and Farrelly 2009; Dhakal and Chevalier 2016; Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; Keeley et al. 2013; Mandarano 2011; Qiao, Kristoffersson, and Randrup 2018). Cleveland has a stronger culture of cooperation among city and county departments and community development organizations (Dewar 2006; Mayer and Keyes 2005, 18). Cleveland also has a stronger community development industry with more capacity to use GSI to enhance neighborhoods (Dewar 2013; Thomson and Etienne 2017; J. Yin 1998).

In sum, the two cases hold some characteristics constant that may influence progress in implementing GSI on vacant residential land: weak market conditions in many neighborhoods that meant real estate development would not drive changes in land use; extensive vacant land, much of it publicly owned; and EPA regulations that forced allocation of public funds for GSI. In addition, the cases differ and therefore offer a test of whether the strength of intra- and inter-governmental collaboration and the capacity of nonprofit community development organizations can influence implementation of GSI that generates co-benefits in neighborhoods, given the importance of non-market actors in this process.

In both cities, the author interviewed leaders in GSI efforts and researched federal and state regulations; legal decisions; city codes; and agency policies, reports, and practices (cited in sources below) related to installation of GSI on vacant residential land. In Detroit, the author attended many meetings where DWSD staff and consultants explained the department’s direction, environmental and community development organizations advanced GSI, and community leaders and government officials worked on a water agenda.⁴ The meetings offered opportunities to ask questions about policy and organizational changes that affected GSI, and DWSD staff and nonprofit organization leaders offered perspectives on installation and maintenance in neighborhoods.

Interviews followed a semi-structured format adapted for the perspective of the interviewee. Questions asked about the interviewee’s role in GSI on vacant residential land and experience implementing specific projects including factors contributing to success and difficulties in completing a project. Although interviews and meetings involved everyone leading implementation or advocacy for GSI, the number of people speaking from any perspective on an aspect of implementation was small. In Detroit, interviews included six public officials, four consultants, a contractor, and ten staff of nonprofit organizations; five were interviewed twice. In Cleveland, interviews included four public officials and five staff of nonprofits (one of these twice). Three additional public officials’ interviews related to both cities; one was interviewed twice. Almost all interviews were recorded and transcribed. When recordings were not feasible, the author and research assistants took extensive notes and added details within a few hours.⁵

Findings: Installation and Maintenance of GSI on Vacant Residential Land

Contrary to expectations, early experiences with GSI on residential vacant land in Detroit and Cleveland were similar, serving as replicating cases rather than contrasting ones. Installations advanced thanks to similar conditions but faced similar barriers. Cleveland’s greater strength in government agencies’ collaboration and in the capacity of the community development industry did not lead to notable differences in the ease of implementing GSI on vacant residential land. Therefore, the cases revealed a few different factors and numerous common ones that affected this type of GSI installation. The implementation process was difficult, far from routine navigation of city procedures or the functioning of a system that could make GSI widespread and sustainable in reusing vacant land, as the legacy city plans envisioned. Table 1 summarizes these factors, and the next sections discuss them, first for Detroit and then for Cleveland.

Table 1.

Summary of Conditions Affecting Use of GSI on Vacant Residential Land.

Condition	Detroit, 2014–2020	Cleveland, 2014–2016
Facilitated GSI on vacant residential land:
EPA requirements:	Required expenditures on GSI.	Required reduction of CSOs using GSI.
Cooperation among agencies:	Agencies did not have history of working together, but facilitators shepherded projects through offices.	City and county had tradition of cooperation, but city government and regional sewer authority had less.
Community development industry capacity:	Slowly recovering from major setback of the mortgage foreclosure crisis and recession.	Strong industry with track record of projects
Interest in GSI:	Residents and nonprofit organizations wanted GSI in neighborhoods. Sewer and other city officials were supportive. No political opposition.	Sewer authority less positive about effectiveness of GSI but supportive. Residents and nonprofit organizations desired GSI to strengthen neighborhoods.
Interfered with GSI on vacant residential land:
Inconsistent goals:	Sewer officials: Meet EPA requirements.
	Mayor: Restore public services, especially police and fire after bankruptcy. Assure vacant land remains available for redevelopment.	Mayor: Strengthen education, safety, economic development; reform police department, improve city services. Assure vacant land remains available for redevelopment.
	Neighborhood advocates and residents: Reuse vacant lots to reduce blight and enhance neighborhoods while also enabling redevelopment.
Lack of regulatory reform and funding for this type of GSI:	Confusion and inconsistency about permitting and inspections.	Permitting delays and outdated city ordinances.
	Primary sewer agency focus on integrating GSI into redevelopment projects.
	No funding from sewer agency; dependence on philanthropy and federal grants to demonstrate how GSI could both manage storm-water and enhance vacant land.	Sewer district funding criteria excluded most projects that might have used vacant residential land.
Lack of plans for sustaining GSI:	No city-adopted plan for reusing vacant land or for prioritizing uses of open space.	Planning Commission adopted plan for land reuse, but not consistent with sewer district plan.
	No legal protection for GSI installed on publicly owned vacant residential land.
	No sewer district commitment to maintaining sites others built on vacant residential land. Dependence on residents for maintenance with insufficient support.

Note: GSI = green stormwater infrastructure; EPA = U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Conditions Advancing GSI Installation

In both cities, the stick of EPA regulation was necessary for resources to go toward GSI, as in other cities (Chaffin et al. 2016; Harrington and Hsu 2018; Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018). The requirements did not smooth implementation, however. The sewer departments faced different requirements and incentives. DWSD had to adhere to an EPA permit. As of 2009, DWSD planned to spend $1.7 billion on gray infrastructure projects with Detroiters responsible for most of the costs (DWSD 2011). “Against the backdrop of staggering unemployment and potential insolvency” (DWSD 2011, 3), a state-led assessment concluded that the proposed projects would impose too great a burden. Therefore, a revised plan and permit, renewed in 2019, incorporated GSI instead. The City of Detroit entered municipal bankruptcy in July 2013, confirming state officials’ assessment of financial distress (Bomey 2017). The permit required DWSD to implement GSI in a large area of the city’s west side and spend $50 million on GSI over twenty years. The goal—though not a requirement—was for GSI to reduce flows into the sewer system by at least 2.8 million gallons by mid-2017 in a twenty-four-hour storm of a type expected to occur every two years. DWSD anticipated that the sewer system would generate an average of somewhat less than one billion gallons per year of untreated CSOs. DWSD would evaluate other measures to address CSOs as well and adapt them to remediate remaining discharges (DWSD 2011; Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy 2019; U.S. EPA 2013).

Unlike the spending requirement facing DWSD, NEORSD had to meet CSO reduction targets. Under a consent decree, NEORSD agreed to construct additional tunnel systems and improve treatment, expected to cost $3 billion. Because the system would still discharge hundreds of millions of gallons of raw sewage annually, NEORSD would spend an additional $42 million on GSI to reduce remaining CSOs by at least forty-four million gallons per year (United States of America vs. Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District 2010). Thus, NEORSD officials had to invest primarily in gray infrastructure, but the agency committed to reducing some CSOs through GSI (NEORSD 2012). The consent decree was probably the first in the country that required the use of GSI to reduce CSOs, not as a pilot project, according to an EPA official. He said in a city with high poverty, “We have to leverage that $3 billion . . . and it has to do more to create value for the community, somehow, otherwise . . . it just creates a liability” for repaying bonds and doing maintenance (personal communication, June 8, 2015).

GSI received initial public and governmental support in both cities. A Detroit consultant said, “You’re not trying to convince people it’s a good idea, and that is huge. The question is not ‘Should we do green?’ It’s ‘How do we do it?’” (personal communication, November 25, 2014). In meetings of neighborhood organizations and the Detroit Future City open space working group in 2015 and 2016, residents repeatedly said they wanted GSI as one way to turn neighborhood vacant lots from liabilities to assets. Residents who led tours of GSI sites in 2016 praised many projects, but their support diminished when projects became unattractive (Stapleton 2017; resident-led tour of sites on Detroit’s west side, July 26, 2016). At a meeting in November 2018 of officials from DWSD and several city departments, the representatives from departments asked repeatedly how they could support DWSD in installing more neighborhood-enhancing GSI. The federal government and foundations, most notably Erb and Kresge, made grants for GSI that could enhance neighborhoods.

In Cleveland, the support was more tentative among public officials, although the Planning Commission had adopted the plan that endorsed GSI for reusing vacant residential land (Cleveland City Planning Commission 2011; CUDC 2008). A planning department leader worried about what would happen if those who installed projects walked away from maintenance, for instance (personal communication, June 9, 2015). Neighborhood-oriented nonprofit organizations and residents strongly supported GSI projects on neighborhood vacant land as long as they were maintained and aesthetically pleasing (Chaffin et al. 2016, 432, 435). A sewer official said community development corporations had “embraced green infrastructure as a branding tool” (personal communication, June 8, 2015).

In Detroit, personal relationships, rather than systems and routines, made implementation possible initially and partly compensated for lack of interdepartmental working traditions. People committed to GSI knew each other and knew city procedures. When city attorneys, for instance, raised issues about land ownership and access that promised to derail GSI installation on vacant lots, land bank and DWSD leaders found work-around solutions, according to a land bank official (meeting of NEW-GI, October 13, 2015; DLBA 2014, N.d.). Another project manager, formerly a city employee, went from office to office to “move the ball down the field” (personal communication, June 3, 2016). The importance of relationships meant implementation might become more difficult after staff turnover.

In Cleveland, city and county officials had a reputation for working well together. A sewer department official said work with city departments usually went very well (personal communication, June 8, 2015). This was especially important because the sewer agency was a regional authority serving an area more than three times the size of the City of Cleveland, not a city department. EPA officials, however, noted times when the relationship was not good, paraphrasing a city official saying to the sewer district, “Oh, we were going to repave that street, but if you’re going to rip it up and repave it [to separate the sewers], then it’s [the cost] all on the sewer district” (personal communication, June 8, 2015). A county land bank official cited the history of community development organizations working together to accomplish changes for neighborhoods; the “community development infrastructure is humongous and very powerful,” she said (personal communication, July 16, 2015).

Explaining Lost Opportunities for GSI Installation on Vacant Residential Land

Despite the conditions that supported GSI in both cities, sewer agencies’ installation of GSI became disconnected from reuse of vacant land, the emphasis of legacy city plans. Nonprofit organizations emerged as the leaders in reusing such land for GSI, but they faced major barriers. Soon after their first installations, both agencies stopped initiating projects on vacant residential land. DWSD reported only the agency’s installations in 2014 and 2015 on the four bioretention sites and on ten of the vacant lots mentioned above and by 2021 had no plans to use vacant land (DWSD 2018, 2021, 2022). Even when GSI was not associated with construction, projects occupied open space already in use, not where demolition had produced vacant land. DWSD installed GSI in parks, on recreation center and school property, and in streets and boulevards (DWSD 2020a; Mobley 2017b). These changes enhanced parks and earned neighbors’ praise but did not advance the reuse of vacant residential land in neighborhoods, as legacy city plans envisioned.

In Cleveland, NEORSD invested in GSI in 2014–2015 on vacant residential land in the four sites mentioned above and on several larger vacant sites to meet the requirement of the consent decree to reduce CSOs. Six of the nine large installations reused vacant, blighted land and involved collaboration with community development organizations (NEORSD 2015). They fit the legacy city plan vision for GSI, producing benefits for residents and neighborhoods while reducing CSOs. NEORSD increasingly shifted instead to substantial subsidies for property owners and developers to install GSI (Atassi and Tobias 2014; Chaffin et al. 2016; NEORSD 2014).

Both agencies’ emphasis on GSI for development sites and built areas placed the responsibility for managing stormwater and for maintaining GSI on developers and property owners. The director of a citywide nonprofit in Cleveland emphasized this point (personal communication, May 21, 2015). The effect was also to focus GSI in the few areas of each city experiencing redevelopment and therefore where the private market was strongest and beneficiaries would have higher incomes than in neighborhoods with substantial vacant residential land.

Why did the agencies’ GSI investment diverge from reusing vacant land in disinvested areas? Numerous barriers existed for any type of GSI installation in any city implementing this new approach (Brown and Farrelly 2009; Dhakal and Chevalier 2016; Keeley et al. 2013); these were evident in Detroit and Cleveland. GSI installation required new, unfamiliar collaborations among departments, but few city procedures enabled GSI projects involving more than one department. City codes and regulations needed revision. Lawsuits (from taxpayers in Detroit and wealthier suburbs in NEORSD’s region) challenged new water drainage charges. Agencies needed to provide guidelines for ways to manage stormwater onsite and to reduce drainage charges. EPA officials sought to support these efforts through webinars and provision of resources that detailed permitting, revision of local codes, design and implementation, and numerous other topics (U.S. EPA 2024). Over time, reforms eased these challenges and particularly facilitated GSI associated with development projects (Bucher 2017; DWSD 2016a, 2020a, 2020b, 2021; Keeley et al. 2013; Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District v. Bath Twp. 2015; Livengood 2017; Michigan Courts 2018; DuBay 2017; Mobley 2017a; Williams, Christian, and Hufnagel 2014).

Some conditions, however, interfered in particular with the reuse envisioned by legacy city plans, and these remained unresolved. For one, those implementing GSI had inconsistent goals. For another, as reforms made other types of GSI more possible, they did not sufficiently enable reuse of vacant land for this purpose. Furthermore, the sewer agencies lacked plans for sustaining GSI on vacant residential land for the life of installations.

Inconsistent goals

The goals of sewer departments’ leadership, other city officials, and neighborhood leaders and nonprofit organizations did not align. Research on adoption of GSI more generally does not mention inconsistent goals as a problem although this may underlie difficulties in coordination among departments, which research frequently discusses (for instance, Brown, Farrelly, and Loorbach 2013; Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; Harrington and Hsu 2018; Sonne 2015). Sewer department officials lost interest in GSI on vacant land that would yield quality of life benefits in neighborhoods. EPA regulations did not require GSI investments to yield co-benefits in reuse of vacant land. An EPA official said sewer districts manage their programs by the EPA permit; “They are not managing their programs based on the services they are providing” (which could include the benefits of GSI for neighborhood conditions and residents’ well-being). “They manage them to be in compliance with the Clean Water Act” (personal communication, June 8, 2015).

In Detroit, DWSD’s deputy director initially served as the articulate advocate for GSI projects in neighborhoods, pointing to their importance in providing benefits for neighbors as well as reducing CSOs (Mobley 2017b). Over time in meetings, however, concerns about finances, staffing, and maintenance tempered her support and left her advocating only for large installations in open space with other uses. In a meeting in November 2018, for instance, she stated forcefully that DWSD would not maintain GSI that others installed on publicly owned land in neighborhoods. In a meeting in February 2019, for another example, she cited many problems with a proposal for district-scale GSI that would use considerable amounts of vacant land and allow the district to capture some fees, saying that any project that sent revenues anywhere besides DWSD would be a problem (meeting re GSI for Eastern Market district, February 21, 2019).

In Cleveland, where work to install GSI had a slightly longer history, NEORSD leaders said they could reduce CSOs better with tunnels than with GSI. “Our mandate is to solve the combined sewer overflow problem in the most cost-effective way. . . . If part of our mandate was public health, safety, and welfare like a city, then we might consider that. But that’s not our mandate” (personal communication, June 8, 2015), one official said, in contrast to what legacy city plans envisioned. A citywide nonprofit’s director of a project to build GSI on vacant neighborhood properties concluded, “There may be inherent conflict between urban greening that is designed for neighborhood stabilization and green infrastructure that is meant for stormwater control” (Albro 2019, 102). A director of a citywide nonprofit that advocated for reuse of vacant land said, “[T]here is a disconnect between projects that are needed for the redevelopment of the city and those needed by the sewer districts to meet federally mandated volume criteria” (quoted in Keeley et al. 2013, 1103).

Mayors did not prioritize reduction of CSOs or legacy city plans’ vision for reuse of vacant land, which meant that strong leadership did not exist in advocating for use of GSI to strengthen disinvested neighborhoods. In Detroit, the mayor emphasized restoring public services, especially police and fire response, following the city’s bankruptcy (Helms 2016; Helms and Guillen 2014). Cleveland’s mayor focused on education, safety, economic development, reform of the police department, and improvement in city services (Atassi 2014; Jackson 2014, 2016). In Cleveland, the mayor did not have authority over NEORSD whose domain covered a much wider area (NEORSD 2018); a sewer authority official said city leaders lacked motivation to address the CSO problem because it was not their permit (personal communication, June 8, 2015).

City officials’ vision for the future was redevelopment, not reuse of vacant land for other purposes that could enhance quality of life, contrary to the perspective of the legacy city plans. In both cities, land banks owned many vacant lots that could be retrofitted for GSI, but who should own the land for such projects and the terms of use were unclear. The Detroit Land Bank board was reluctant to sell land to DWSD for GSI because perhaps a later reuse would produce property taxes, according to staff from a nonprofit organization (personal communication, June 5, 2015). In Cleveland, a nonprofit’s staff said,

Because of being a Rust Belt city, we’ve been so desperate to see development and new construction. . . . There’s still concern around GI [GSI] being a long-term strategy to managing vacant land because I think we still would love to see more development occur. (Personal communication, July 20, 2015)

Research on GSI sites in Cleveland concluded that GSI “is considered a risky land use for local governments to commit to when compared to traditional development” where impacts on local tax revenues can be calculated (Chaffin et al. 2016, 440).

Neighborhood nonprofit organizations emphasized social equity and valued the co-benefits GSI could provide where residents had experienced disinvestment. They also prioritized redevelopment, however, and canceled installation of GSI if redevelopment became possible in their neighborhood (Chaffin et al. 2016, 435).

Lack of regulatory reform and funding for GSI on vacant residential land

As the sewer departments became less interested in investing in GSI on vacant residential land, nonprofit organizations gained prominence in encouraging GSI to improve residents’ quality of life, but they continued to confront significant problems in regulations and needed to find sources of funding for GSI other than the sewer agencies. Studies of all kinds of GSI installation mentioned these hurdles often. Lack of coordination among departments unaccustomed to collaborating contributed to the challenges in resolving inconsistent and unclear regulations. Although funding remained a challenge, GSI related to development projects had access to more financial assistance from the sewer agencies whether through grants or reduction in drainage fees (Brown and Farrelly 2009; Chaffin et al. 2016; Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017; Harrington and Hsu 2018; Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018; Keeley et al. 2013; Mandarano 2011; Qiao, Kristoffersson, and Randrup 2018; Roy et al. 2008).

Nonprofits in both cities promoted a “green culture shift” (Detroit Future City words) in residents’ support for GSI. In Detroit, organizations such as the Sierra Club, the Nature Conservancy, and Detroit Future City and numerous community development organizations engaged residents in reusing vacant land for green purposes, including GSI, that would improve neighborhoods. They coordinated with city officials outside DWSD to advance projects and by 2020 worked with small businesses and churches to replace parking lots with GSI and gain credits on drainage bills, though these would not show a return on investment for many years. Nevertheless, major hurdles had stood in the way.

Nonprofits’ efforts had immediately confronted confusion about permitting and inspections for installing GSI as a new use of vacant land. Neither city had protocols in place in 2014 leaving sewer district contractors and nonprofit organizations not knowing what they needed. A Detroit zoning official described a 2015 meeting to review plans for the four bioretention sites and to identify needed permits:

The head of plan review is a structural engineer who says, “There are no structures—you don’t need a permit.” And then DPW [Department of Public Works] and DWSD have no jurisdiction on private property so, “There is no permit we can give you; we have no jurisdiction.” (Personal communication, May 17, 2016)

A contractor for the project said, “Long story short, we got a letter from the city saying just moving dirt around, not a new building, no electrical—so they said no permit required” (personal communication, May 20, 2016). The director of a nonprofit’s early GSI project said that getting the approvals took a year because so many departments had to be involved and no one knew what to do. She said,

[W]e went to Buildings and Safety to get a building permit. From there we learned . . . it’s also Public Works; it’s also Public Lighting; it’s also trees. . . . There were a lot of unknowns that we . . . figured out as we went along with . . . every department. Then we realized . . . you still have to tie into the sewer so . . . Water and Sewerage had to be involved. (Personal communication, August 18, 2015)

By mid-2020, the process had evolved but remained complex and unclear, according to a citywide nonprofit organization’s staff (Detroit Future City 2019; DWSD 2020b; personal communication, February 18, 2020). DWSD application forms for credits against the drainage fees said only to list all permits applied for. A guide from Detroit Future City provided a list of seven offices to contact regarding permits but could only provide the vague guidance, “Depending on your project, the following permits and approvals may be required” (Detroit Future City 2019, 54).

Detroit officials and their consultants made considerable progress in revising codes and regulations through 2020. The recommended reforms, however, resembled those for cities experiencing development without much vacant residential land (Detroit Post-Construction Stormwater Management Ordinance 2020; DWSD 2017, 2021; Williams, Christian, and Hufnagel 2014; Wisconsin Sea Grant 2017). By 2020, Detroit officials provided extensive documentation and training for meeting stormwater regulations on development sites. But the review did not address requirements that interfere with reducing runoff from vacant lots, for example, such as grading and fill standards following demolition. Design guidelines, codes, and regulations said almost nothing about GSI on the city’s expanses of vacant residential land.

Nonprofit organizations became leaders in Detroit in demonstrating how city regulations could change to facilitate GSI on vacant land and in communicating policies to nongovernmental actors (Detroit Future City 2019). For instance, staff from the Nature Conservancy in meetings in 2019 and the Detroit Collaborative Design Center showed how vacant land could receive stormwater from nearby commercial sites, sometimes with numerous owners (Detroit Collaborative Design Center 2018; Nature Conservancy 2025). These efforts sped agreement about policy and practice in city government, though details remained unresolved and these projects had not been implemented.

The Detroit experience suggested legal and regulatory issues related to GSI on vacant residential land could eventually be addressed, though progress was slow. Information like that provided by Detroit Future City (2019) and facilitators, hired with project funds, who shepherded projects through needed approvals could make nonprofits’ projects on vacant residential land feasible in the meantime.

In Cleveland, staff from a nonprofit organization installing GSI said they had needed to meet with directors of multiple departments in numerous agencies to get approvals (personal communication, September 14, 2017). Numerous hurdles existed. For instance, city officials would not approve disconnection of downspouts from the combined sewer system on buildings next to vacant lot GSI installations “due to lack of an official city ordinance or policy” on downspout disconnections and “concerns about routing stormwater from privately owned parcels onto city-owned parcels” with uncertainty about liability and maintenance. Staff adapted designs to bypass permitting that would have required six to twelve months to resolve (Albro 2019, 95).

Without funding from the sewer agencies, nonprofit organizations depended on grants from federal sources and philanthropies. In Detroit, DWSD, with a grant from the Erb Family Foundation, offered matching funds for nonresidential property owners to install GSI.⁶ The funds paid part of the substantial expense of installing GSI but left most of the cost to property owners, in contrast to large subsidies elsewhere (Hsu, Lim, and Meng 2020). In Cleveland, NEORSD offered substantial grants for design and construction of projects that met strict criteria related to the permit (NEORSD 2017, 3–4). These averaged close to $70,000 per project as of early 2017. The criteria excluded many projects that might have advanced reuse of vacant residential land as the plans envisioned, however (Robb 2018).

Lack of plans for sustaining GSI on vacant residential land

GSI was expensive so those installing it needed confidence the installation would endure. Three principal issues undermined that confidence. For one, lack of city-adopted plans for reusing vacant residential land meant nonprofit organizations and others did not know where they could build GSI with assurance that the sites would remain for the life of the investment. Second, nonprofits who wanted to use vacant residential land for GSI could lack land control or legal protection from development on sites where GSI was installed. Third, credible plans did not exist for maintenance for the life of projects on vacant residential land.

These challenges relate particularly to legacy cities with substantial amounts of vacant land, often publicly owned. Research on GSI more generally rarely notes these problems. Developers’ and property owners’ decisions determine location of much GSI when local regulations emphasize requirements for stormwater management in connection with development, and zoning and other regulations provide a guide for the types of GSI that are acceptable (Wisconsin Sea Grant 2017). Property owners are also responsible for maintaining the GSI and assuring it remains or replacing it with an installation that also meets a city’s regulations. For GSI installed on open space already in use, such as a park, interagency agreements can address maintenance, although coordination among agencies is necessary (Fitzgerald and Laufer 2017). In contrast, in research that touches on legacy cities’ use of GSI, lack of plans for overall land use and for maintenance come up repeatedly as hindering implementation and long-term function (Albro 2019, ch. 5; Heckert and Rosan 2016; Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018).

In Detroit and Cleveland, these three challenges were major concerns. In Detroit, no officially adopted open space plan existed to identify locations where GSI could both reduce CSOs and enhance neighborhoods. In the plan for EPA, DWSD designated a priority area of more than one-fourth of the city’s area (DWSD 2014). Another department identified other large areas for use of a federal grant for GSI (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 2015). Neither was specific enough. The leader of one nonprofit organization’s project said, “It’s irresponsible to be throwing these things in the ground and not knowing what the implications are on a broader scale. . . . I would not mess with more infrastructure . . . without some kind of bigger plan” (personal communication, August 18, 2015). A citywide nonprofit’s staff who was advocating for an open space plan for the city asked,

How do we decide what the priorities are for that vacant land, all this great potential that we have, and how do we determine what goes where? . . . How much land is needed to prioritize green stormwater infrastructure? . . . [The biggest barrier to answering that is] [a]cknowledgement that we need a plan, that we need policies, that we need a public process. (Personal communication, June 5, 2015)

Another nonprofit’s staff said a plan for vacant land would be “transformational” for the city (personal communication, March 18, 2020). Detroit Future City advocated for an open space plan developed with strong community engagement and for integration of such a plan into the master plan and zoning (Detroit Future City 2016; Lewinski et al. 2015). In a meeting in November 2018, however, the deputy director of DWSD said a detailed citywide plan for GSI would not happen, signaling that this was not a mayoral or departmental priority, and no progress had occurred by mid-2020.

In contrast, Cleveland’s City Planning Commission identified eight directions for sustainable reuse of vacant land. The Commission listed criteria for each use, including GSI, and mapped specific areas from least to most preferred for each type (Cleveland City Planning Commission 2011). NEORSD’s plan showed large catchment areas where CSOs would occur after gray infrastructure construction was complete; it identified and ranked specific smaller areas (NEORSD 2015). The Commission’s and NEORSD’s preferred areas differed. The NEORSD plan still did not give nonprofit organizations confidence that their investment in GSI would endure. Staff from a nonprofit organization said working with NEORSD was difficult because the sewer district judged that GSI on small, scattered sites would not handle enough stormwater to merit investment (Robb 2018)—a reflection of consent decree requirements.

A second problem facing nonprofits’ use of vacant residential land for GSI was lack of land control or legal protection from development if the land remained publicly owned. By 2015, neither city had resolved how to protect GSI on vacant residential land in neighborhoods from destruction for other uses. DWSD officials and advocates for nonprofits’ GSI investments on vacant land said deed restrictions or conservation easements, for instance, could protect the installations, but the four bioretention sites that the Land Bank continued to own had neither (Wayne County Register of Deeds online records, accessed 2020; Lewinski et al. 2015). City officials could explore long-term leases and licenses to use city-owned land, but neighborhood-oriented nonprofits were often unsure they could afford leases or ownership for decades to come (discussions at neighborhood meetings on vacant land reuse, 2019–2020).

Finally, plans for maintenance for the life of projects on vacant residential land did not exist in either city by 2015. In Detroit, DWSD committed to maintaining the four bioretention sites for three years, far short of their expected usefulness. Early federally funded greening of neighborhood lots for stormwater management included no provision for maintenance; plantings died, and dumping increased. Residents complained. DWSD officials asserted that neighbors should maintain the sites, but neighbors rarely could do so because of other responsibilities, lack of knowledge, or disability. A former city official said, “The residents cannot maintain it. There may be residents who step up to the plate but most of them will not even know what they are doing” (personal communication, May 17, 2016). If these sites are fulfilling requirements facing DWSD, nonprofit staff said in meetings, the department should maintain the sites. DWSD stated that those installing GSI had responsibility for maintenance no matter how much the project helped achieve EPA’s requirements (DWSD 2020b; meetings of the Erb GSI workgroup 2017–2019 and sessions of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Green Infrastructure Conference, May 2017).

A Cleveland nonprofit’s staff said, “The number one deterrent [to more widespread use of GSI] is maintenance” (personal communication, July 20, 2015). A county land bank official said of small-scale GSI: “Unless there is some long-term source of funding to pay people over the long term to take care of these sites, it’s [maintenance] just going to continue to happen in the same patchwork fashion.” Expecting neighbors to take care of the sites was “not feasible . . . not possible or appropriate” (personal communication, July 16, 2015). An EPA official said the agency had expected maintenance would be the responsibility of the sewer agencies (personal communication, June 8, 2015): “The whole idea here is that this is infrastructure. We don’t burden them [neighbors] with maintaining the pipes in the middle of the street. Why would we burden them with this?”

Conclusion

The experiences in Detroit and Cleveland show that the vision of legacy city plans has not been realized for the reuse of vacant residential land for GSI. The slow, difficult process of reusing such land for GSI is consistent with research on slow absorption of vacant land in disinvested areas for urban agriculture or for natural areas where development will not occur. This is the case even though GSI had regulatory force and funding behind it and other possible uses such as urban agriculture did not.

Changes over time showed that the sewer agencies’ and neighborhood-oriented nonprofits’ commitments to different types and locations of GSI diverged and hardened making use of GSI to reduce CSOs while also providing co-benefits in neighborhoods less and less likely. Although previous research pointed to many hurdles for any type of GSI installation and maintenance, the perspective from a short period of time or from projects that did not occur on vacant residential land provided hope of reducing barriers (Albro 2019; Chaffin et al. 2016; Keeley et al. 2013). Experiences in these two legacy cities show, however, that agency-installed GSI projects will not make a significant difference in the use of vacant residential land in disinvested neighborhoods. Studies of GSI installation that do not distinguish types of projects or that look at one point in time underestimate the difficulty in transitioning vacant land to GSI in legacy cities. The hope expressed in previous research that integration of stormwater management and urban planning objectives could be achieved remains unrealized with respect to reuse of vacant residential land in ways that yield co-benefits for residents and strengthen disinvested neighborhoods.

The changes in both cities exposed intractable incompatibility in goals. Community-based organizations and advocates for low-income residents saw GSI as a reuse for vacant land that could improve neighborhood conditions and benefit residents. The sewer agencies aimed to meet the EPA requirements, and officials did not believe that reuse of neighborhood vacant lots could reach that goal, a view in part justified but in part due to long-standing agency commitments to gray infrastructure systems. Elected city officials had many concerns other than stormwater management to address so did not take leadership in advancing use of GSI on vacant residential land. They also sought to assure no land use interfered with future redevelopment that could add to tax revenues and attract residents.

The differences in goals meant that no one calculated the total costs and the total benefits of GSI compared to gray infrastructure. EPA officials thought a calculation that included co-benefits could show GSI was a better investment. EPA staff might be able to require such calculations, but the agency’s charge is to enforce the Clean Water Act, and dictating very specific details of implementation may not help in advancing that. Sewer agencies considered only the reduction in gallons of CSOs and no co-benefits and argued that gray infrastructure was more cost effective than any type of GSI (Great Lakes Water Authority 2018; NEORSD 2015). Innovations require time for reform of systems and development of routines and standards that then make their use more efficient (Rogers 2003). The use of GSI was too new for its cost-effectiveness to be known with confidence despite sewer officials’ assertions. Residents and neighborhood advocates considered only the improvements in residents’ quality of life and neighborhood conditions, though no one had calculated specific numbers with respect to those co-benefits. City leaders needed to take the perspective that considered the total costs and total benefits of all these outcomes, but in cities facing many challenges, mayors had no capacity to make this a priority. Urban planners, whose knowledge covers infrastructure, environmental issues, neighborhood development, and residents’ well-being, could push for a more complete assessment of GSI and gray infrastructure investments. Planners’ job definitions in city governments do not necessarily include such work, but a city sustainability director and planners working in citywide nonprofit organizations could take leadership. A perspective that considers both reduction in CSOs and generation of co-benefits would be needed to bring stormwater management and urban planning visions together in ways previous scholarship advocated (Chaffin et al. 2016; Harrington and Hsu 2018; Hopkins, Grimm, and York 2018).

Reforms in city regulations and procedures addressed GSI installation associated with new development. These changes made implementation of installations connected to development more routinized and feasible and managed stormwater associated with that new construction. Therefore, projects occurred where the demand for land was strongest, where development was occurring, and where the population had higher incomes than in the disinvested neighborhoods that dominated the cities’ geography. This emphasis “may inherently privilege residents with higher socio-economic status,” researchers said of Philadelphia (Heckert and Rosan 2016, 264). This was not the outcome that legacy city plans envisioned.

More reforms in procedures and regulations could facilitate nonprofits’ investments in GSI that reuses vacant residential land with federal, state, and philanthropic funding (Albro 2019). These changes are likely over time as advocates continue to work with city officials to demonstrate solutions. Nevertheless, lack of funding will continue to constrain the extent of nonprofits’ installations.

Changes did not give anyone confidence that GSI on publicly owned vacant residential land could be sustained for the life of installations. Therefore, the likely outcome in disinvested areas is that residents and nonprofit organizations continue to implement small neighborhood projects for greening without the construction that would allow for significant stormwater retention. If demolition regulations dictate fill and grading to reduce runoff from vacant lots, the properties can be used for small, less expensive beautification projects that neighbors might have capacity to maintain.

Ultimately, GSI is unlikely to realize the vision of the legacy city plans even if it becomes more widespread for sewer agencies’ stormwater management. Other legacy cities may face similar, slow, limited achievements in reusing vacant residential land for GSI. Sewer agencies in some of those cities also appear to have focused GSI where development is occurring and in public parks and school grounds, not on vacant property in disinvested neighborhoods.⁷

Nevertheless, progress in implementing GSI in Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Milwaukee, legacy cities that installed some GSI on vacant residential land, points to the importance of mayoral leadership, an innovative sewer agency director, and substantial reorganization within sewer agencies to support GSI. These changes then provided leadership and backing for other reforms, such as clearer permitting (Dewar et al. 2018; Madden 2010; Mandarano 2011; Nusser 2015). Such conditions were not yet evident in Detroit and Cleveland.

Framework plans like those for legacy cities cannot address possible futures in detail. They could, however, inspire next-generation plans that do so, anchored in greater reality of residents’ views, institutions, infrastructure, and natural systems, and therefore yielding better ideas for how vacant residential land can become an asset in disinvested neighborhoods. City officials or neighborhood advocates could develop plans that provide more analysis and detail about where and how to reuse vacant residential land in ways that improve neighborhood conditions (Cleveland City Planning Commission 2011). For GSI, such plans could provide detail for where and how neighborhood advocates could implement small projects to retain stormwater on vacant lots (e.g., Detroit Future City no date).

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The author thanks Alicia Alvarez, Joan Nassauer, Matthew Weber, and Glenn Nelson for helpful ideas throughout this project and thanks Grace Cho, Moira Egler, Rebecca Labov, and Kelsea Dombrovski for research assistance.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research for this article: Funding was provided by the Water Center of the University of Michigan and by the Fred A. and Barbara M. Erb Family Foundation.

ORCID iD

Margaret Dewar

Notes

Author Biography

Margaret Dewar is professor emerita in the Urban and Regional Planning Program, Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, at the University of Michigan. Her research focuses on how planners can affect investment and disinvestment in cities that have lost much of their peak population.

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