Solutions and challenges for sustainable integrated management of stormwater in urbanized areas of Romania

Abstract

In this age of urbanization, sustainable development requires good sewerage concepts for the future - not only in growing cities, but also in rural areas. Efficient stormwater management has become an increasingly important national and international concern. Soil waterproofing is oriented to a large extent by land use planning decisions. Land use is a compromise between social, economic, and environmental needs, such as housing, transport infrastructure, energy production, agriculture, nature protection. Limiting soil waterproofing can be done by reducing land use, or by continuing soil waterproofing, but using land already occupied, for example, industrial sites, decommissioned. Keeping water in the city by allowing it to seep into the soil and accumulate in water bodies offers many benefits, including recreational space for people living in the area and creating a cooling effect during heat waves. The use of green infrastructure is a tested component of nature capitalization, to obtain environmental, economic, and social benefits. As an example, instead of building flood protection infrastructure, a green solution can be used to capitalize on the functions (services) of nature: restoring wetland to be able to take over excess water, protecting communities in the areas at risk of flooding. The best way to develop green infrastructure is to take a carefully integrated approach to land management and strategic land use planning. All land users and all policy sectors need to be involved early in the process of developing green infrastructure, with some of them taking responsibility. The purpose of this article is to present some effective measures for urban stormwater management that can be adopted both in cities and in rural areas, and secondly to present the importance of the concept of “Green Infrastructure” (G.I.). In this article is shown that just by simply reorganizing the territory by proposing vertically arranged parking lots and by proposing bioretention solutions, a series of benefits appear such as the cooling effect during heat waves, flood control, clean water and air, and attractive recreation areas, etc.