These designs were produced in collaboration with fellow graduate student Lion Waxman, with support from faculty at The Conway School, and a project core team including representatives from Howard Stein Hudson, Mass Audubon, and the Town of Hampden. Concept design reviews provided by Jonathan Fogelson, Jesse Bellemare, and Genevieve Lawlor.

Some of my contributions to this project include:

• "existing conditions" base map design and rendering
• GIS-based site analyses
• on-site data collection
• illustration of summary analyses maps
• conceptual design development 
• line work and inking for final design renders 
• conceptual grading
• section drawings (both conceptual and scaled) 
• perspective illustration 
• document layout and formatting 
• technical writing 
• aerial photography
• core team communications
• meeting planning
• collaborative development and styling of analysis maps

Programs used: Photoshop, InDesign, ArcGIS Pro, AutoCAD, G Suite, iNaturalist

The full report, including analyses, can be viewed here.

Project Context

Hampden, Massachusetts, located in the Connecticut River Basin, has seen a significant increase in heavy rainfall and flooding over the past sixty years, affecting lives, infrastructure, and wildlife habitats. Major floods in 1938, 1955, and 2005 have significantly impacted the town. The town has also seen a rise in wildfires. The 2015 Hazard Mitigation Plan and 2021 Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) Program highlight increased precipitation, flooding, and forest fires as major concerns. Main Street, a key transportation and emergency route, is a top priority, with the undersized bridge over East Brook near its confluence with the Scantic River getting an MVP Action Grant-funded redesign to address frequent flooding.

The town's gray stormwater infrastructure is also being overwhelmed, prompting the call for green infrastructure solutions in the East Brook watershed. The Main Street bridge replacement project included an infrastructure assessment to identify possible intervention sites in the watershed. This assessment focused on 35 culvert locations, narrowing down to three priority sites for culvert replacement and green infrastructure designs. The prioritization matrix considered both the culverts' locations at major transportation sites, and the opportunity for visible, accessible intervention within the municipal right-of-way.

Project Stakeholders

The primary stakeholders are the Town of Hampden, and the residents within the East Brook watershed. Additionally, core team partners include the Town Conservation Commission; engineering firm Howard Stein Hudson (HSH), which is conducting the bridge redesign; project consultant MLM Enterprises; Mass Audubon, which owns Laughing Brook Wildlife Sanctuary at site A and is collaborating to allow use of space on-site adjacent to the ROW for road stormwater treatment; and the private landowners abutting project sites.