Pluvial flooding in urban areas: the role of surface drainage efficiency

Abstract

Pluvial flooding in urban areas may derive from the limited or temporarily reduced efficiency of surface drainage, even when the underlying storm sewers are properly designed. This study focuses on the impact of uncertainties in the operational condition of the surface drainage system on pluvial flood hazard. The flood propagation model FLURB-2D is implemented on a selected study area in the town of Genoa (Italy). Synthetic hyetographs based on the Chicago and bivariate copula methods with suitable return periods are used as input. While simulating the design rainfall, inlet operational conditions are varied stochastically using a Monte Carlo approach. Results confirm that microtopography has the potential to impact the efficiency of surface drainage and consequently to produce local flooding, with significant water depth in zones of flow concentration. Furthermore, the derived inundation maps allow the highlighting of areas with insufficient design of the surface drainage system (inlet size and positioning).