Sweetwater Preserve
Reidsville GA Community Floods
Reidsville, Georgia
2024
Perspective of the proposed Sweetwater Preserve during blue sky conditions
Funded By
Through the Equitable Resilience Program with EPA, SMM is working with 15 communities across the south and southwest. Reidsville, GA is a town with a population just over 2,300 and faces mounting challenges of aging and ineffective infrastructure, limited opportunities for economic growth and employment as well as environmental hazards like chronic overland flooding, air and water pollution and intensifying extreme heat.
Northeast Reidsville is particularly susceptible to flooding during rain events which have increased in quantity and intensity over recent decades. In this neighborhood, several years of careful analysis have shown that inefficient drainage infrastructure and ditches, constricted tributaries, and development in ecologically sensitive areas have contributed to flooding of residents’ homes.
Jackie Jones, Founder of Reidsville GA Community Floods, photographed in front of her home
Photo Credit:
Giancarlo D'Agostaro
“You have no idea how devastating and heartbreaking it is to deal with flood waters mixed with sewage that are always trying to get into my home. I can literally open my window and touch the water at times.”
Jackie Jones, Founder, Reidsville GA Community Floods
The community-based organization, Reidsville GA Community Floods, in collaboration with Anthropocene Alliance (A2), has long been advocating for studies and projects to address the flooding challenges faced by residents. The result of that effort is Sweetwater Preserve, a proposed 24-acre stormwater and nature park that employs a series of swales and piped connections to convey water between wetland areas, each successively deeper to direct water away from homes and to nearby Thomas Creek. This site was selected due to the severity of flooding in the surrounding neighborhoods, the availability of land appropriately sized for the local flooding challenges, and its adjacency to Surrency Park, an existing neighborhood park.
The public parks in Reidsville are racially divided. Surrency Park, which primarily serves the Black residents in Reidsville, has fallen into disrepair over the years. Previous efforts by local advocates to improve the park have been ignored and the community space continues to lack investment and prioritization for upgrades from the city. With the investment in the nature-based flood mitigation strategy located directly adjacent to Surrency Park, this design also provides the opportunity to improve the neglected park space.
The 24-acre site proposed for Sweetwater Preserve would reduce flood risk for over 130 nearby homes
Photo Credit:
Giancarlo D'Agostaro
