(Review prepared by Lori Saldaņa, for the San Diego-Imperial Counties Sierra Club's September-October, 2003, newsletter.)
Nestled into a steep, barren hillside overlooking the Rio Tijuana, only a few miles south of the US-Mexico border, a creative experiment in natural resource management is taking place on a daily basis. The location is known as EcoParque, and the experiment involves taking treated wastewater that is normally discharged into the ocean, and re-using it to irrigate and transform an otherwise arid slope into a verdant park and small wildlife preserve, complete with lush hiking trails and magnificent views of downtown Tijuana.
When local documentary maker Michael Bedar heard of this experiment, he decided this sustainable use of water was worthy of his first local video production. The result is a short film called simply "EcoParque." In February, he shared his video with the Sierra Club's Border Committee.
Bedar has captured images of daily life in Tijuana, emphasizing the dry and paved over urban setting, and intersperses them with conversations of various people who work at EcoParque or live nearby. He interviews people walking along the trails, or standing under the canopy of trees, in contrast to the gritty urban scenes. These help paint an interesting portrait of a facility that is not only efficient, but also educational and naturally lovely thanks to reclaimed water.
We hear from one employee that thousands of students tour EcoParque each year, to learn more about basic water recycling and treatment principles in a "real world" setting.
We also learn that EcoParque has not only transformed a hillside, but the actions of the residents in the surrounding neighborhood (about 1200 households are connected to the EcoParque collection system).
Where once some people illegally dumped toxic waste down their drains, interfering with the facility's operations, they have now willingly changed their activities to help protect the trees and plants that are irrigated with the wastewater after it goes through a simple treatment process. Oscar Romo, one of the original directors of the treatment plant, explains that meeting with the neighbors and educating them about the toxicity problems in an open, trusting way quickly led to their cooperation. Once they understood the quickly led to their cooperation. Once they understood the impact their actions were having, they changed their behaviors, stopped dumping harmful wastes down their drains, and became part of the EcoParque success story.
Bedar has created a lively (catchy music) and educational view of an alternative sewage treatment plant that would be a useful teaching tool for teachers and environmental organizations alike. "EcoParque" (available in both English and Spanish) shows viewers there is a simple solution for one of humankind's oldest problems: reconsidering the waste-products of civilization (in this case, sewage) and turning them into a resource.
The creators and supporters of EcoParque realized that these wastes could also be valuable for fertilizing native plants high above Tijuana, and for recreating a natural habitat in an area that has been rapidly covered with concrete and buildings. Michael Bedar realized there was an educational and even uplifting story behind this project, and has created a video that deserves to be shared with anyone interested in discovering how something we often think of as "waste," to be dumped out to sea, can, in fact, be put to good use for the benefit of many.
