Effective impervious and BMP effectiveness at watershed scale

Summary

Urban stormwater management practices aim to reduce the negative impacts of impervious surfaces covering the landscape. This can be accomplished by redirecting stormwater runoff onto pervious (or permeable) surfaces, like lawns, gardens, or parklands, and allowing the water to infiltrate into the ground. Small, distributed stormwater BMPs (best management practices), like rain gardens and bioretention basins, are often utilized to accomplish these stormwater goals. Many methods have been proposed for measuring the cumulative impacts of these small, distributed BMPs. However, their cumulative effect is not fully understood. This project will test two of the most promising measurement methods on two large datasets. The modeled results will then be verified by comparing them to data collected from a pair of watersheds: one in St. Paul, MN and another in Madison, WI. This work will relate the amount of stormwater infiltration to the abundance, distribution, and/or type of stormwater BMPs present in these watersheds.