Project Overview
In Summer 2024, the Domestic Subteam began a partnership with the Festival Beach Community Garden & Food Forest in Austin, Texas, addressing water insecurity and rising costs through practical, community-driven engineering. The project aims to help the garden lower their dependence on potable water supporting local sustainability goals while building technical capacity within the community. All solutions are shaped by ongoing feedback from residents to ensure long-term usability and alignment with local priorities.
Throughout Fall 2024, the team worked closely with the garden and engineering professionals to co-develop an engineering Work Plan focused on stormwater flow diversion, efficient irrigation, cistern-based rainwater storage, reclaimed water reuse, and solar-powered water pumping. With further guidance from the team’s civil and environmental engineering mentors, the team used CAD, GIS, solar and hydraulic calculations to restructure designs in Fall 2025 and Spring 2026. The team has been working on finalizing their alternatives analysis, creating preliminary designs, completing water calculations, debating cistern designs, and reaching out to contractors for an eventual green light on beginning construction for the project.
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