Mapping Storm Water Sewer System and using GIS

Abstract

Lithology of Chennai region associated with rapid horizontal and vertical expansion is the major causes of flooding in urban areas especially during monsoon seasons. Urban storm water influences the service life of urban infrastructures. The rainfall intensity and characteristics of catchment area are the major factors for designing urban storm water drainage facilities. Urban flooding was primarily a concern of municipal and environmental governance, and has now attained the status of ‘disaster’, which has drawn the attention of environmental scientists and disaster managers. Chennai is bounded on the east by Bay of Bengal and on the remaining three sides by Kanchipuram and Tiruvallur districts. Chennai receives approximately 1300 mm of rainfall per year on an average most of this (~800 mm) falls during the northeast (NE) monsoon in the months of October through December. Chennai city currently encompasses a metropolitan area of almost 426.5 km2. Study area, Periyar Nagar comes under North Chennai of division 109. Storm water drainage line is along with inadequate/poor integration between road and urban storm water drainage infrastructures. Remote Sensing and GIS is a useful tool for spatial planning of storm water issues. This study encompasses integration of road and urban storm water drainage infrastructure with the help of topographic map, satellite imagery and GPS data. Storm Water sewer system mapping follows the methodology by adopting GPS, GIS and surveying. Google earth is an additional source for deriving spatial information on drains, roads etc. ArcGIS software aids in classifying the drains based on the attribute information and predicts places prone to flooding.