A real time urban flood monitoring system was deployed into two streets (Earnshaw and San Diego Streets) on España Boulevard, Manila. The system consists of a ground-based pressure sensor and a rain gauge connected to a locally designed data logger with telemetry capabilites using GPRS network. Data from the stations are received by a TCP server and is processed in order to provide visual information and realtime flood updates through mobile and web services. An ahead of time flood estimation system was implemented using a Random Forest algorithm in order to provide an early warning advisory to motorist and users of the system. Results from the test validation show that the resulting prediction model indicates a strong predictive performance without relying on rainfall-runoff model obtained through geological and hydrological surveys.

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This paper presents the design and development of urban flood monitoring stations that use pressure sensor to determine flooding levels. GPRS and SMS were used to communicate data from the remote stations to a server located at a data center. A web-based visualization tool has been developed to allow access to data in real-time. Based on experiments, the sensor measurements have a difference of 0.872cm to 3.067cm with actual values. The higher differences tend to be associated with higher water levels while lower differences were noted for lower water levels. With further experimentation, these differences can be used as correction factors to get to a more accurate reading, specially for purposes of R&D or modeling, though for issuance of warnings to the public, these differences are small enough especially since warnings are mostly based on qualitative descriptions such as knee-deep or waist deep flood level. Image capture was also experimented on and is envisioned to be incorporated with the station to provide a means to verify water level by providing a visual reference. Likewise, the image capture device will serve as a redundant sensor that can also determine flood levels thru image processing. Currently, two prototypes are deployed along Espana Avenue, an area known for flooding. Data from the stations show the typical behavior of flood water but currently, there is no reliable means to verify the accuracy of sensor readings, until the image capture device is installed. The data are viewable thru a web-based visualization tool.