All the talk in the news about flooding recently reminded me of a conversation I had at the office shortly after moving to New Orleans that went a little something like this: “Ok, I think I understand the scope of the project. Have we submitted the site plan to the City for stormwater management approval?”
“What stormwater management approval?”
“Do you not have to demostrate implementation of long term best practices for stormwater management in order to be considered for a building permit?”
“No.”
In a city whose streets flood after a 20 minute downpour, I found this very hard to believe. I now realize I’ve taken for granted the very progressive nature of the city I lived in for 13 years that requires a civil engineer to calculate rainfall percentages and a landscape architect to accommodate on-site retention of storm water. I realize the same approaches to stormwater management won’t hold true in an area with a high water table such as New Orleans but I’d thought I’d share this diagram from the Water Environment Research Foundation to get the ball rolling instead of… well… floating!
lospecs.com 