Take-Home Final Exam

Exercise Performed: April 24, 2017

Submission Date: April 28, 2017
Performed & Prepared by: Brandon de Jesus - Shen Jiayun- Tri Nguyen - Kelly Pham

Prepared For: Dr. Kauser Jahan

Sustainable Civil and Environmental Engineering
Section - 1&2

From: Brandon de Jesus, Paul Entwistle, Tri Nguyen, Kelly Pham, and Stephanie Wakeley
Subject: Green Infrastructure Lab Report
April 7th, 2017

Dear Dr. Torlapati,

Enclosed is our teams report on the Green Infrastructure. Included in this report are the results
and answers pertaining to this lab using the EPAs National Stormwater Calculator. This was
conducted by all undergraduate students at Rowan University during the month of March. This lab
investigated the effect of green infrastructure in urban and suburban areas. With the EPAs
National Stormwater Calculator, the percentage change in infiltration with the installation of green
infrastructure can be studied. The data obtained during this lab experiment was collected by using
the calculator and comparing the effect on both different areas. The final results between both will
be compared.

For this report, our team observed the runoff and infiltration of rainfall for Manhattan, New York
and Glassboro, New Jersey. The respective impervious areas for the cities are 90% and 25% to
represent one urban and suburban environment. Each area was simulated to include 10% of the
citys area as green infrastructure. Comparisons of each citys runoff before and after the addition
of green infrastructure are also attached to this report. After receiving the green infrastructure,
Manhattans runoff was reduced by 4% and Glassboros runoff was reduced by 2%.

If you have any questions or concerns about the report, please feel free to contact any of us at our
respective emails.

Sincerely,

Brandon de Jesus, Paul Entwistle, Tri Nguyen, Kelly Pham, and Stephanie Wakeley

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OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this experiment is to study the effect of green infrastructure in urban and suburban
areas. Using the EPAs National Stormwater calculator, green infrastructure can be installed in
both settings and then compared to their base-case scenario and the other areas results as well.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The locations picked for this experiment were lower Manhattan in New York City, and Rowan
University in Glassboro, NJ. Manhattan was chosen because it is an extremely densely populated
and heavily paved area, which was considered an urban area with over 90% impervious land area.
On the other hand, Rowan was chosen as a suburban location with a less than 75% impervious
land area. Rowan Universitys campus is a largely suburban campus, with areas of grass and
woodland, but there is also paved areas as well. This comparison makes it possible to analyze the
relative effectiveness of green infrastructure in urban and suburban locations.

Figure 1: Scenario 1, Manhattan, New York

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 Figure 2: Scenario 2, Glassboro, New Jersey

The parameters that were used in the EPAs National Stormwater Calculator for both locations
are summarized below in Table 1.

Table 1: Parameters for each Location

Parameters Manhattan, NY Glassboro, NJ

Site Area 50 acres 50 acres

Soil Type Moderately High Moderately Low

Soil Drainage 0.05 0.50

Topography Flat Moderately Flat

Precipitation Rain measured at Central Park Rain measured at Somerdale

(49.36 in) (47.43 in)

Evaporation Measured at Central Park Measured at Woodstown

(0.20 in/day) (0.18 in/day)

Climate Change No Change No Change

Table 2: Percentage of Land Cover for Both Locations

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 Manhattan, NY Glassboro, NJ

Type of Land Percentage Type of Land Percentage

Forest 0 Forest 15

Meadow 0 Meadow 0

Lawn 10 Lawn 60

Dessert 0 Dessert 0

Impervious 90 Impervious 25

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Scenario 1: Manhattan, New York

Manhattan, New York has very low area for infiltration due to it being a major city. The vast
majority of the city is paved for either roadways, sidewalks, or foundations for the numerous large
buildings of the city. The main source of any infiltration for Manhattan are any local parks or small
yards. Other than those sources there is little infiltration so the remaining rainfall becomes runoff.
Table 3: Type of Green Infrastructure
LID Controls Percentage

Green Roofs 4

Rain Garden 2

Street Planters 2

Permeable Pavement 2

Total Percentage 10

As seen in Table 3 above, adding green infrastructure to the city of Manhattan would be very
beneficial. The city is very large meaning the potential of the area for any type of green
infrastructure, or GI, is very probable. Since the city is highly populated, there are many buildings
which may be able to support the installation of a green roof to reduce some runoff and improve
the air quality. The other GI projects would allow for more infiltration on a smaller scale.

With the added GI, the percentage of infiltration increased by 3% for Manhattan (as seen in the
pie charts) and the amount of rainfall evaporated increased by 1%. Assuming that the evaporation
percentage increases by the same amount of 1.00%, then the percentage of area needed for GI in

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Manhattan to increase infiltration by 1% is 3.33% of Manhattans 50 acres of land, or about 1.665
acres of land.

Scenario 2: Glassboro, Jersey

Glassboro, New Jersey has the same area as Manhattan but a much higher hydraulic conductivity
which means that water passes through Glassboros soil more readily. Glassboro features towns
and suburbs which have more areas where infiltration can occur such as lawns and forests. Despite
its high infiltration rate, more GI could be introduced to Glassboro to further reduce runoff.

Table 4: Type of Green Infrastructure

LID Controls Percentage

Infiltration basins 4

Rain Garden 2

Green Roofs 2

Permeable Pavement 2

Total Percentage 10

Based on the attached summary results of National Stormwater Calculator Report, the percentage
change in infiltration was 2% for the same annual rainfall of 42.97 inches with infiltrations
obtained from baseline and current scenario were 74% and 76%, respectively, with adding types
of green infrastructure, the infiltration was increasing and alleviated the percentage of runoff by
1% which can be seen on the piechart. If only a 1% of infiltration increase was needed, then only
5% of the citys land would be needed for GI use.

Manhattan increased its infiltration more than Glassboro because Glassboro already has a high
infiltration rate; Manhattans impervious area means that there is a lot of soil that isnt being used
to infiltrate rainfall. If more GI was added to Manhattan, then it would make use of the citys
potential for infiltration.

CONCLUSIONS
The results of the scenarios suggested that the added green infrastructure lessened runoff by about
4% in Manhattan and 2% in Rowan. This indicates that Manhattan had a greater percent reduction
of runoff. It also means that Manhattan must have had a much greater reduction in total runoff
compared to Rowan, since runoff percentage of total rainfall is much higher in Manhattan. This

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difference is likely due to the fact that Manhattan has much less infiltration and evaporation of
rainfall than Rowan. Since it is mostly paved, the addition of green infrastructure to the city would
have a larger effect compared to the same infrastructure at Rowan, where most of the rainfall is
able to infiltrate without the added green areas. This can likely be extrapolated to urban and
suburban areas in general, meaning ultimately that the rainfall effects of green infrastructure are
more pronounced in cities than in more suburban or rural areas. The final reports from the EPAs
National Stormwater Calculator for each scenario is attached at the end of report for further
analysis.