Integrated urban design and open storm drainage in our urban environments: merging drainage techniques into our city’s urban spaces Misagh Mottaghi a, *, Henrik Aspegren a, b and Karin Jönsson a a Water and Environmental Engineering at Department of Chemical Engineering, Lund University, Lund, Sweden b VA SYD, Malmo, Sweden * Corresponding author. E-mail: Misagh.Mottaghi@chemeng.lth.se Abstract Flooding is the most common natural hazard in Europe. Cities cannot rely only on underground solutions which are expensive and inflexible. In order to reduce the negative impacts of flood, open and surface solutions play a key role in the efficiency of urban drainage systems. Utilizing the earth’s surface as part of sustainable water infrastructure, also as powerful element for creating the space, adds multiple values to our urban environments. This article suggests a framework to increase the likelihood of turning the idea of flood resilient city to a best practice. The paper is clarifying the design principles. The target is turning a space to a functional place by apply- ing drainage techniques in urban design, which requires robust local integration between the urban space and technical solutions. The study of storm water management in the Swedish and Dutch contexts was an important base for this formulation. Considering the important share of urban design in urban transition success, the paper is focusing on categorizing the required steps of flood resilient urban design. Key words: adaptive urban landscape, blue green infrastructure, ecological urbanism, sustainable drainage sys- tems, urban design principles, water sensitive urban design INTRODUCTION In 2050 around 67% of the world’s population will live in the cities according to the United Nations projection. Such urbanization has usually negative impacts on the hydrology and water quality (Qin et al. 2013). The human health is in danger as well as ecosystems of the large number of cities due to emission of contaminants and nutrients (Finotti et al. 2014). The climate is changing and is expected to get even more unpredictable and intense. However, the level of vulnerability to climate extremes will determine the severity of impacts (IPCC 2012). In the year 2014, almost 54% of the world population resided in cities (UN 2014). 15% of the world population, mainly urban popu- lation, is predicted to be at risk of being flooded from sea level rise and river discharge (Ligtvoet et al. 2014). The combination of rapid urbanization and climate change results in more flood issues, water scarcity and water pollution (Van Leeuwen 2013). Due to the global warming, severity of extreme rainfalls will increase ( Jongman et al. 2014). While the bulk of cities’ storm water drai- nage has been designed in the absence of collaboration and trans-scale ways of thinking, more dynamic systems should be devised. It is necessary for the government to introduce the planning strategies and highlight water challenges in all scales of planning. Sustainable urban water manage- ment is the key to success and is based on integration of urban planning and urban water cycle management (Wong et al. 2013). Sustainable planning is only achieved through combination of top-down and bottom-up approaches and it is different from city to city. Considering the climate © IWA Publishing 2016 Water Practice & Technology Vol 11 No 1 118 doi: 10.2166/wpt.2016.016 Downloaded from https://iwaponline.com/wpt/article-pdf/11/1/118/381298/wpt0110118.pdf by guest on 14 June 2020