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The Portland Bureau of Environmental Services is wrapping up design of concurrent projects on two Southwest Portland streets to convert ditches into swales.

Planned improvements to approximately 2,760 feet of ditches along Southwest Stephenson Street, between 35th Avenue and Boones Ferry Road, are intended to reduce stormwater runoff into nearby Tryon Creek and increase pedestrian safety with the addition of 4-foot-wide, paved shoulders, said Amin Wahab, BES Fanno-Tryon watershed manager. Similar improvements are planned for 920 feet of ditches along Southwest Hamilton Street, between 45th and 47th avenues, to reduce runoff into Fanno Creek. Combined, the projects are estimated to cost about $330,000, Wahab said.

Currently, the ditches on Hamilton and Stephenson streets carry stormwater directly into the Fanno and Tryon creek watersheds. BES staffers identified the two streets and other side roads with unmanaged runoff as contributors to high levels of pollutants entering the waterways, Wahab said.

鈥淲e went through a process of identifying where those streets were, so Hamilton and Stephenson came to the top,鈥� he said.

Converting both streets’ ditches into swales should reduce the amount of pollutants carried by stormwater into nearby creeks, Wahab said. This includes infilling the ditches and planting a combination of grasses and shrubs that filter runoff.

Construction is scheduled to start in spring or summer and wrap up by fall.