In the past month, 14 cities across the country have been flooded. Why? Because: urban residents always regard rainwater as a nuisance that must be eliminated at all costs!
1. People moving to lower areas
People tend to move to higher ground, but water flows to lower areas. However, urban construction plans are completely opposite:
Green belts are higher than sidewalks, and sidewalks are higher than roads.
The lowest point in all cities is not the green belt, but the road surface and underpasses.
Citizens mainly interact on the road surface, and underpasses are often necessary routes.
When people move to lower areas, they walk into tragedy.
2. Rainwater turns into sewage
The roofs, squares, and road surfaces do not allow water infiltration. The green belts that could infiltrate water are situated higher than the road surface. Rainwater collects on the road surface and then flows into the sewers, mixing with domestic sewage and is discharged out of the city, passing through sewage treatment stations before finally being discharged into rivers, lakes, and seas.
Precious rainwater does not infiltrate underground or replenish groundwater. As a result: resources turn into sewage, like a beautiful woman turning into a devil.
3. Weather becomes extreme
The groundwater level keeps dropping, the ground becomes increasingly dry, humidity decreases, and the weather becomes worse.
Extreme weather causes sudden shifts between droughts and floods; when it's dry, it's extremely dry, and when it's flooded, it's extremely flooded.
With the rapid expansion of urban paved areas, the proportion of green space relatively shrinks, and the intensity of rainfall continues to upgrade, eventually breaking the limit of the underground sewage pipes. The result is that the city gets flooded.
4. Environment deteriorates
During heavy rains, water, soil, grass, leaves, and branches from the higher green belts flow onto the sidewalks and then onto the road surface.
a) Soil erosion
The green belts' capacity to store rainwater is limited, and instead, they require frequent artificial irrigation, wasting water resources.
Topsoil loss is detrimental to vegetation growth.
Rainwater turns into sewage, increasing treatment costs.
b) Dust flying around
Soil flows onto the sidewalks and road surfaces, gets crushed by wheels into dust, and pollutes the air.
The mist-like phenomenon often seen in cities should actually be "haze."
c) Clogged sewers
Dirt, leaves, and garbage entering the storm drains easily clog the sewers, increasing the difficulty and cost of municipal maintenance. Sewage overflowing onto the ground creates foul odors and affects traffic.
d) Methane gas emission
Storm drains along the roadside often emit foul odors, which promote the breeding of rats and mosquitoes.
e) Manholes become traps
There are countless manhole covers on the road surface and sidewalks, which can easily become traps during rain.
f) Road aging
Frequent soaking by rain accelerates the aging of many road sections.
g) Ground subsidence
I consult geological experts and municipal experts:
If there is less groundwater, will the ground sink? If the degree of subsidence varies, will it collapse?
5. Solutions
Municipal companies have a plan: separate rainwater and sewage. That is, construct dedicated pipelines for rainwater discharge and no longer mix rainwater with sewage for discharge.
Even a fool knows that this is just a scheme for municipal companies to make money: earning money from the government by building pipelines and then selling water after collecting rainwater.
I, Sun Ying (pen name: Sun Wu Che), majored in accounting and work as an auditor, and I am indeed an outsider in terms of municipal, water conservancy, gardening, transportation, and geology. While auditing the cost of municipal projects, I discovered environmental defects in municipal facilities, which left me with deep feelings. I sincerely ask experts not to laugh at me and also ask municipal companies not to hate me.
Here are my solutions:
1. Dig lower green belts, parks, edges, corners, and other areas, and dig deeper in the center so that rainwater can flow in and infiltrate underground to replenish groundwater, without discharging it outside the city. Plant dense forests around these areas to enclose dangerous zones. Accumulate ash, dirt, grass, leaves, branches, and intercept plastic and other garbage.
2. Plant more large trees, especially local species with tall and broad canopies, around buildings, roadsides, parking lots, squares, sports fields, campuses, and nursing homes. Minimize lawns. The terrain around tree roots should be low to facilitate rainwater inflow.
3. Before it rains, loosen the soil in green belts and around tree roots because loose soil can best absorb and infiltrate rainwater. Cover the loose soil with dead branches and leaves to protect the soil from being washed away.
4. Green the flat roofs of buildings to reduce urban temperatures and weaken the "greenhouse effect."
5. Western architecture has two major styles: Gothic with pointed roofs and Byzantine with round roofs. I wonder, whether pointed or round roofs, are they warmer in winter and cooler in summer? If so, China should learn from them.
6. To green the city, plant small saplings, which are easy to survive and cost less. Transplanting large trees involves cutting off their crowns, resulting in low survival rates, low environmental benefits, and high costs.
Gong Zizhen wrote in "Record of the Sick Plum Pavilion": "Cutting down the upright, nurturing the side branches, pruning the dense, stunting the young branches, weeding out the straight, suppressing the vitality." Those "mentally disabled" admire "sickly beauty."
Nowadays, they even admire "imperfect beauty."
Question: Is this about killing the righteousness of trees or destroying the righteousness of people?
Key words of this article: Rainwater turns into sewage, the city becomes like a devil. Rainwater seeps into the ground, citizens thank God.
Drafted on the evening of July 29, 2011,
Linzzi District, Zibo City, Shandong Province,
Name: Sun Ying
Pen Name: Sun Wu Che
Word: Deming
Phone: 13869306637
Attached are relevant water conservancy papers by Sun Wu Che, available online:
"The Human-Caused Reasons for China's Great Drought"
"Dongzhou Wants Rice, Xizhou Does Not Release Water"
"Who Is the Culprit Behind the Extraordinary Mining Disaster in New Wen, Shandong?"
"China Must Be Alert to Locust Disasters"