Whether trickling off your rooftop or raging down LA's concrete river, water is sacred in California and yet tragically so much of it is lost after big storms, but not in Studio City.
"A cistern is essentially a man-made holding tank of water underground to help us capture rain water," said Maria Adame, from TreePeople.
Adame is the Senior Manager of Outdoor Access for TreePeople.
"The water comes in from the rooftops in our buildings," Adame said. "The conference center behind has a rooftop at a slant, all that water gets diverted into the cistern."
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All the ground is permeable. After this winter's pounding rain storms over the last few weeks, the entire area is filled to the brim.
"That means we have 216,000 gallons of water underground that we can use from now until about October to water our plants and trees all around the park," Adame said.
The park is 44 acres, but imagine having a way to collect all that rain for your own home. TreePeople are big on promoting ideas to harvest the rain from big storms and small.
But it's not happening and plans to move forward with ways to do it are often sidelined for other projects statewide.
Homeowners can do their part by using rain barrels and taking advantage of reimbursement programs with their local cities.
But for TreePeople, they say they want to find something more sustainable for a future that could still be running dry.
"We believe in nature-based solutions which is really just looking to nature for answers to environmental and sustainability issues," Adame said.
