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The Green Infrastructure Design Guide (GI Design Guide) is a comprehensive design guide to help agencies, developers, design professionals and construction firms design, build and maintain green infrastructure in San Mateo County. This guide builds on a previous guidebook (Green and Sustainable Streets and Parking Lots Design Guidebook) that focused on green infrastructure applications for streets and parking lots, and introduced the concept of “sustainable streets.” This updated 2020 guide provides a more comprehensive look at design options and strategies for green infrastructure in buildings, sites and streets. A goal of the guide is to further support integrated complete streets and green streets, advancing San Mateo County toward building more sustainable streets, which are designed to make streets safer and more comfortable for all users, while protecting water quality and enhancing communities. Learn about our Sustainable Streets Master Plan here.

The GI Design Guide does not provide technical guidance for meeting regulatory requirements for new and redevelopment green infrastructure designs. Developers and others looking for technical guidance for C.3 Regulated Projects under the Municipal Regional Stormwater Permit should visit the updated C.3 Regulated Projects Guide. Together, the GI Design Guide and the C.3 Regulated Projects Guide are referred to as the “GreenSuite.” 

This fully interactive PDF guidebook allows users to easily click-navigate to different chapters and sections via the main navigation menu at the top of the guide located within any chapter or by clicking on the chapter and section titles in the table of contents. The return button located at the top of any content page will link back to the table of contents. Note that if printing, set the scale to 90% to ensure the full bleed edges of the document are printed properly. 

Green Infrastructure Maintenance “The Essential 8” Video

To help municipal staff, contractors, volunteers and others who may be involved with the long-term maintenance of green infrastructure in San Mateo County over time, we have created a short maintenance video documenting the “Essential 8” principles for a well-maintained green infrastructure facility. The “Essential 8” boils down the best practices and potential pitfalls of green infrastructure maintenance, as well as the proper tools and protection to ensure safe and effective maintenance on any green infrastructure project and for any practitioner, whether a city staff, maintenance contractor on development projects, facilities lead at school district, or a homeowner transitioning a lawn to a water resilient landscape.