Water 2015, 7(3), 993-1012; doi:10.3390/w7030993

A Mapping of Tools for Informing Water Sensitive Urban Design Planning Decisions—Questions, Aspects and Context Sensitivity

Sara Maria Lerer * , Karsten Arnbjerg-Nielsen

 and Peter Steen Mikkelsen

Department of Environmental Engineering (DTU Environment), Technical University of Denmark, Miljøvej, Building 113, Lyngby DK-2800, Denmark

^*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. 

Academic Editor: Miklas Scholz

Received: 19 November 2014 / Revised: 13 February 2015 / Accepted: 25 February 2015 / Published: 11 March 2015

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Drainage Systems)

View Full-Text   |     Download PDF [243 KB, uploaded 9 June 2015]   |    

 Browse Figure

 

Abstract 

Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD) poses new challenges for decision makers compared with traditional stormwater management, e.g., because WSUD offers a larger selection of measures and because many measures are multifunctional. These challenges have motivated the development of many decision support tools. This review shows that the tools differ in terms of the types of questions they can assist in answering. We identified three main groups: “How Much”-tools, “Where”-tools and “Which”-tools. The “How Much”-tools can further be grouped into tools quantifying hydraulic impacts, hydrologic impacts, water quality impacts, non-flow-related impacts and economic impacts. Additionally, the tools differ in terms of how many aspects of water they address, from those focused only on bio-physical aspects to those attempting to find the best WSUD based on multiple criteria. Finally, we suggest that variability among the tools can partly be explained by variability in local context including conditions such as type of existing stormwater systems, groundwater conditions and legislative frameworks.View Full-Text

Keywords: Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD);  sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS);  Low Impact Development (LID);  Best Management Practice (BMP);  Green Infrastructure (GI);  urban stormwater management;  decision support tool; decision support system;  aspects of water

▼ Figures

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. (CC BY 4.0).

For further details log on website :
http://www.mdpi.com/2073-4441/7/3/993