Transportation

Transit agencies to test thermal cameras to beef up traffic safety

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By Anna Rossow
Capital News Service
Federal grant money will help Michigan’s Department of Transportation implement increased safety measures for public transit drivers and pedestrians. MDOT will receive over $500,000 in funding to install thermal imaging cameras on public transit vehicles to help prevent collisions with people and animals in a variety of weather and light conditions. According to MDOT, the cameras will be installed on up to 60 vehicles at four rural and urban transit agencies: the Blue Water Transit Area in Port Huron, the city of Alma, the Community Action Agency of South Central Michigan based in Battle Creek and the Regional Transit Authority of Southeast Michigan. The state’s application for the technology started when Janet Geissler, a mobility specialist at the department, saw a news release on such cameras being used on cars to detect pedestrians, cyclists and animals
She said it is a good technology that is applicable to transit vehicles. She said, “Collisions between transit vehicles and people are a really serious issue.”
The cameras will be mounted on various-sized vehicles – large and small buses, vans and motor coaches – she said. 
Geissler said visible light cameras are being used to alert drivers of obstacles but don’t work as well in poor lighting conditions. 
“The thermal imaging cameras will detect that obstacle, the person, whether it’s nighttime, whether it’s a snowstorm, whether it’s foggy or whether there’s sun glare,” she said.

Land

New strategies driving public lands acquisitions

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By Gabriel S. Martinez
Capital News Service
The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is looking for deals to create more green space in populated areas as part of an updated public lands strategy. The goal is to equitably provide public access to green space, wildlife habitat and public hunting closer to where people live, department officials say. Efforts in the past two years include acquisitions in Van Buren, Monroe and Ionia counties. 
Those involved buying private land adjacent to public land to consolidate green spaces. 
Scott Whitcomb, the director of the DNR’s Office of Public Lands, said a major pending deal involving Black River Ranch in Sanilac County is expected to close by the end of 2025. That property acquisition will bring in about 8,844 acres, including over 14 miles of the Black River, the East Branch of the Black River, Stewart Creek and three lakes including 150-acre Silver Lake. It will become part of the Pigeon River Country Forest Management Unit.

Art

New book explores the wonders of inland waters

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By Isabella Figueroa 
Around 97% of all the water on the planet is in the vast oceans that cover more than two-thirds of its surface. “But Seas are not the only body of water that make Earth special,” ecologist David Strayer writes in his new book. “Beyond the Sea: The Hidden Life in Lakes, Streams, and Wetlands,” presents the lesser-known facts of freshwater ecosystems and how they affect our everyday lives. 
Before retiring in 2016, Strayer spent nearly 50 years studying freshwater ecology, most recently at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, where he developed an expertise in the nearby Hudson River. The book lays out the good, the bad and the ugly of the world’s inland water bodies, which Strayer reports are home to some 2,600 plant species and 150,000 animal species, about half of which are insects. While celebrating that abundance of life the book doesn’t shy away from the serious threats and challenges that inland waters face, including pollution, invasive species, climate change and the damaging impacts of dams and water diversions.

Climate

Great Lakes region hit hard by steel industry pollution, report finds

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By Joshua Kim 
Pollution from coal-based steel production causes hundreds of premature deaths each year, with people in  the Great Lakes region bearing much of the burden, according to a recent report. The nonprofit research group Industrious Labs looked at 17 coal-based steel plants and coke facilities operating in the United States and the health and environmental problems they cause in surrounding communities. 
Emissions from these facilities include pollutants linked to significant health and environmental problems, including nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, fine particulate matter and lead. 
Together their pollution is responsible for as many as 892 premature deaths per year, according to Industrious Labs. Those emissions also trigger around 250,000 cases of asthma symptoms annually, are linked to cancer rates 12% to 26% higher than the national average and result in up to $13.2 billion in annual health care costs, the report says. 
The group based its results on an Environmental Protection Agency computer model that uses self-reported industry data. “Communities don’t have access to this type of information,” said Hilary Lewis, the steel director at Industrious Labs. “By doing this report, we are giving people who live closest to these facilities, who are most impacted, who are most likely to be experiencing these health harms, a tool in advocating for cleaner alternatives.”
All but one of the country’s coke plants and all of its operating coal-based steel plants are located in Great Lakes states, according to the report.

Land

Tiny homes tackle homelessness around Michigan

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By Donté Smith
Capital News Service
Tiny homes are gaining attention in the state as a potential solution for housing challenges, offering a creative approach to affordability and community-building. 
While often showcased as a minimalist lifestyle choice on platforms like Netflix, where shows such as “Tiny House Nation” highlight their appeal, they’re also being deployed as a tool to address homelessness and housing density. 
These compact dwellings, defined by the International Residential Code, are 400 square feet or less in floor space. Although they can be built on foundations, most are built on trailers. More people are experiencing homelessness as affordable housing has become harder to find. 
Homelessness in the state increased by 8% in 2022 compared to 2021, going from 30,113 people to 32,589, according to the latest report from Michigan’s Campaign to End Homelessness. In Michigan, where state-specific rules for tiny homes are absent, zoning and utility infrastructure often dictate the feasibility of projects. Matthew Grzybowski, the advancement operations manager for Mel Trotter Ministries, is navigating these complexities through the Hope Village initiative in Grand Rapids.

Land

New quarantines on firewood are helping reduce the spread of invasive insects

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By Gabriel S. Martinez

Capital News Service
The Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development is placing quarantines around the state to contain an outbreak of invasive species, mainly by way of transporting firewood infested with pests. Laurel Downs, the forest health conservation coordinator for the national Don’t Move Firewood campaign, said when insects get introduced into a new ecosystem from global trade, sometimes through packaging material and mostly by firewood transportation, they typically lack any natural predators in the new environment. 
That allows them to infest the wood. 
“Usually it’s years before people discover them, so they tend to be well-established by the time managers start trying to tackle the issue,” Downs said. Quarantines are regulatory measures to prevent the spread of the pests after they have been established into a new ecosystem, according to the agriculture department. Cheryl Nelson, a forest health forester who does outreach for the Department of Natural Resources, said quarantines are effective when they’re used – but the lack of public awareness perpetuates problems.
According to a report by the Don’t Move Firewood campaign, Michigan is one of 26 states with external pest-based quarantines that include firewood as a regulated item and restricts the entry of some out-of-state firewood. State quarantines have been placed in Michigan on the mountain pine beetle (all firewood), the balsam woolly adelgid (fir) and the hemlock wooly adelgid (hemlock with needles and twigs), according to the report. 
Other invasive insects include the emerald ash borer, spongy moth and the spotted lanternfly. 
To be transported legally to a quarantined area, firewood must be treated to a specific standard.

Nearshore

Study warns of climate risks to hazardous waste facilities

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By Anna Rossow 
Capital News Service
A new Government Accountability Office study of hazardous waste facilities found them at risk of damage from climate-related events such as flooding and hurricanes. 
Some are in the six-state Great Lakes region, including ones near southern Lake Michigan. 
According to the study, there are more than 700 treatment, storage and waste facilities in the U.S., 68% of which are at risk of a climate hazard such as wildfires, storm surges and rising sea levels, which can be exacerbated by climate change. 
The study recommended that the Environmental Protection Agency provide assistance and training on managing facility climate risks. Kimberly Tyson, the manager of the hazardous waste section in the materials management division at the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, said hazardous waste includes ignitable chemicals that may harm people. 
She said the department tries to inspect Michigan facilities at least four times a year. 
The department’s district staff inspects waste containers to see if they are being stored properly and are of good integrity without any leaks, she said. 
“They’re also looking at the facility and making sure that it’s in compliance with our rules and nothing is out of place,” said Tyson. “They’re not getting sloppy with housekeeping and stuff like that.”
Facilities have backup plans or contingency plans in case a leak occurs, Tyson said. For example, there may be a secondary containment area to catch leaked waste, and facilities may have dust on hand to soak up leaked waste as well. She said part of a facility’s contingency plan in case of a leak includes working with first responders and medical personnel in training scenarios so they know how to address any hazards. 
Secondary containment areas are sloped to catch leaked material in one area, she said, and some facilities have a “blind sump” which pumps out the waste to dispose of it or put it through a treatment process until it is no longer hazardous. 
However, according to the EPA website, flooding and rising water can cause facility infrastructure to fail. 
Alan Steinman, the Allen and Helen Hunting Research professor at the Annis Water Resource Institute at Grand Valley State University, said that a hazardous waste spill can affect water quality in different ways, depending on what chemical leaks.

Land

Rural population shrinks in Michigan, political clout weakens

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By Victor Wooddell
Capital News Service
The number of young people moving to small towns and rural areas across America has been increasing, but not so in Michigan, where populations in rural areas are shrinking and aging, according to a recent report by the Census Bureau. This national trend reverses a pattern since the 1980s in which more people moved from rural areas to urban centers. In Michigan, however, both urban centers like Detroit as well as rural areas continue to lose people under 45, Census data shows. According to the Michigan Center for Data and Analytics, the state is experiencing slow overall population growth, but that is due to immigration, not the birthrate, which is declining because an increasing proportion of residents is becoming older. 
While births have declined, deaths have been increasing, and the state’s overall population is expected to begin decreasing in the next 10 years, the center says. These trends are especially pronounced in the Upper Peninsula and other rural areas. 
Among all counties in the U.P., only Houghton County gained in population in the last 10 years.

Water

New book explores efforts to restore West Michigan’s ‘water of the walleye’

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By Isabella Figueroa

Hundreds of years ago, the Ottawa people called it Ken-O-Sha, or “water of the walleye”—a 26-mile tributary of Michigan’s Grand River where the fish were abundant. Today it is known as Plaster Creek, a name that refers to the gypsum mines that polluted the waterway near Grand Rapids beginning in the mid-19th century and drove away the walleye. A new book by two Calvin University professors explores an ongoing effort to restore Plaster Creek to a healthy stream worthy of its original name. A creek that “was known for the living creatures in the water got changed to a resource that was used to promote great wealth for certain people, not all people,” said co-author Gail Heffner, emerita professor of urban studies. “So our hope would be to be able to rename the creek someday.”

Four years in the making, “Reconciliation in a Michigan Watershed: Restoring Ken-O-Sha” highlights the Plaster Creek Stewards, an initiative launched in 2009 by the book’s authors and led by Calvin faculty, staff and students to improve the watershed with help from local schools, churches and other partners.

Water

NOAA to study Great Lakes climate change with underwater robots

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By Georgia Hill

As climate change increasingly shapes the Great Lakes region’s ecology and economy, scientists plan to use underwater robots to gather previously inaccessible data they say will help communities adapt. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced in September that its Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory received $1.9 million through the federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. It’s one of three NOAA labs that received $6.7 million in total for ocean and Great Lakes observing systems, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, which includes the agency. In a press release, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the funding “will help NOAA improve and expand climate and weather services so that communities are better prepared to tackle the impacts of climate change.”

A portion of the funding will allow GLERL and partners to deploy autonomous underwater vessels to monitor more of the Great Lakes ecosystem during a greater portion of the year than earlier technology allowed. The funding will also augment long-term tracking of water temperatures by increasing the number of moored heat sensors in the lakes.