Stormwater Management in the Aftermath of Natural Disasters

After the April 17, 2011 tornado that devastated the City of Tuscaloosa, AL, community leaders, business owners, and homeowners all wanted to rebuild as soon as possible. There were a number of issues that needed to be addressed, including providing safe housing for affected people and initial massive cleanup of the destroyed areas and drainage conveyances. Financial hardships also caused delays in reconstruction in many areas. After more than a year, many of the damaged homes and business have been repaired, and some of the destroyed sites have now been rebuilt, but many areas are still vacant. One of the issues needing to be addressed by the land owners is compliance with new building code provisions, including some that affect stormwater management. Over the years, various stormwater research activities have been conducted in the Tuscaloosa area, including land development surveys and development of effective remote sensing techniques, inappropriate discharge detection research, stream sediment contamination, advanced stormwater treatment development and testing, urban bacteria sources and fates, and stormwater characterization monitoring. One area of special interest and need to support the redevelopment activities is the role of disturbed urban soils and the design of infiltration systems in compacted soil areas. This paper focuses on the role of urban soils and the designs and expected performance of infiltration facilities, especially how they can be most suitably sized and located in small commercial establishments. Special surface and subsurface infiltration tests were conducted soon after the tornado for comparison with our earlier work to assist in the development of performance production functions for the types of infiltration facilities most suitable for the area and soils.