The future-obsessed website Inverse has a nice article about how permeable pavement is the greatest.

And Spokane doesn't even get a mention. Not fair, I say, because the Lilac City is trying the porous surfacing out on a number of roads, including on bike lanes near Glenrose as well as by Gonzaga. 

But what is permeable pavement? Why, just look below.

Instead of diverting stormwater (and all the junk on the street that gets caught up in stormwater) to a gutter and either straight to the river or treatment plant, the permeable pavement lets the water soak through to the soil, where it is naturally filtered.

How magical.

It's cool and, yes, futuristic, as the Inverse article spells out. But where's the Spokane love?

Canada and Chicago, instead, get the love. Still, the piece has some nuggets of interesting stuff and quotes that will please even the wariest of roadway reading.

- Permeable/pervious/pourous pavement has been used since the 1800s. The U.S. has experimented with it for almost 40 years.

- “Every eight months in the United States we have the same amount of oil being discharged off our roads as was spilled in the Exxon Valdez oil spill,” saidGeoffrey Scott, a researcher with the Medical University of South Carolina, in a recent lecture.

- There's a pavement research center at the Berkeley and Davis campuses of the University of California. Who knew?