In the past few years, Montgomery County has seen a steady increase in construction of shopping centers – including the Clarksburg Outlets. While the outlets are an important clothing retail source to Clarksburg residents,  the way they were built is extremely detrimental to the environment.

The Clarksburg Premium Outlets are located in Clarksburg, MD, directly off I-270 Exit 18. They have over 70 stores, including a food court and an outdoor amphitheater, and were rapidly built and opened in 2016. The economical benefits and simple necessity for retail stores in Clarksburg are indisputable. Yet, the approach to modeling and constructing the Outlets was poor, rushed, and neglects to consider the environment. In particular, the parking lot is unnecessarily large, and the choice to cement over a massive ground area rather than build a tall garage is much more damaging to the environment.

A parking lot is an impervious surface, meaning rain and or storm water cannot penetrate through the cement and seep through the soil to recharge and replenish groundwater supplies. . The percolation of water into the soil is a critical step to the ecosystem, as the soil acts as a filtration system for the water before it gets dumped through storm drains into larger bodies of water and eventually used. The danger of a parking lot is that water skips this filtration step, instead rapidly running off the ground and into drainage systems, picking up oils and trash along the way. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the presence of impervious surfaces in urban areas means a typical city block generates more than five times more runoff than a forested area of the same size

“Via large parking lots, pollutants are taking a freeway into the Chesapeake Bay”, explained Timothy Short, a global ecology teacher at Poolesville High School. He often runs field trips to the Outlets to explain this issue to students. This stormwater runoff ruins the vital ecosystems of the bay through erosion, contamination, and depleting oxygen supply for marine life.

The decision to build a parking lot rather than a garage is one that is cheaper, a choice that is often made in construction. Not only this, but the time it takes to cement over a grassy area is much shorter than the time required of constructing a parking garage. Without a direct consequence or impact to humans, there is little incentive to discontinue this approach.

“The question isn’t whether or not we should continue to build, because expansion is inevitable. Rather, it is are we willing to pay the extra dollars for the most environmentally cautious approach? The answer is no, not yet at least”, said Short.

Although other places in Montgomery County have fortunately decided to take on the financial burden of parking garages, for example Pike and Rose and Downtown Crown, it is unlikely that what is good for our environment will take precedence over what is most feasible. This means the future of the Chesapeake Bay and local streams is in jeopardy, and their ecosystems will subsequently begin to deteriorate.