Storm Drainage and Urban Region Flood Control Planning.

Stormwater within urban regions has generally been considered a common enemy so that the objectives has been to dispose of the runoff as quickly as possible. The major components of stormwater management systems have consisted of storm sewers, open and closed conveyance conduits and occasionally detention storage and pumping facilities. It has been reported that the investment in storm drains is three times the investment in works to protect the flood plain and the annual damages from inadequate storm drains may well exceed the damage inflicted upon urban flood plains. Formulation of stormwater management systems includes defining the planning objectives, determining the rainfall runoff characteristics of the area, selecting the performance criteria, developing and evaluating alternatives, and designing the implementation procedures. Storm drainage systems are a major planning task because of the large variety of management alternatives that are possible and because the impact of works on communities can be very great. Specifically this paper attempts to 1define the subject area and describe its characteristics 2 review past concepts in storm drainage 3 describe the current context of planning these systems 4 describe the alternatives available and the implementation requirements and 5 discuss institutional factors including the federal interest and conclude with some observations on current planning approaches. Author