Ecohydrology of Urban Ecosystems

EHSMu: a New Ecohydrological Streamflow Model to Estimate Runoff in Urban Areas

“…The combination of hydrological and ecological elements within ecohydrological models has been explored in depth for natural environments and the importance of taking into account both components has been largely underlined (Botter et al 2007;Laio et al 2001;Rodriguez-Iturbe et al 1999). In urban areas, this aspect has recently become more popular: to guarantee a sustainable management of soil and water resources, a better understanding of the whole urban ecosystem is required (Marchionni et al 2019). Investigating hydrological and ecological processes and their interactions provides a strong support for urban design and water management (Li 2012).…”

“…Many ecohydrological urban models focus on small scale, investigating the interactions among impervious surfaces, vegetation, and atmosphere in urban areas (Grimmond et al 2010;Marchionni et al 2019;Vico et al 2014). At the moment, however, only a few ecohydrological models have been developed at catchment scale (Liu et al 2013;Shields and Tague 2015) and the integration of ecohydrological processes to define the runoff generation at urban scale needs to be further investigated.…”

Development and modelling of realistic retrofitted Nature-based Solution scenarios to reduce flood occurrence at the catchment scale

“…Today, 50% of the world's population lives in urban areas and this number is expected to rise by 2050 (United Nations 2015). Urbanisation impacts the urban hydrology by altering the water balance of cities (Barbosa et al 2012;Walsh et al 2012;Marchionni et al 2019). Impermeable surfaces and hydraulically efficient drainage networks decrease the infiltration and evapotranspiration volume, increasing the amount of superficial runoff (Walsh et al 2005;Brown et al 2009).…”

Investigating the Role of Vegetation on Mid-Afternoon Microclimates in a Residential Courtyard

“…At the neighborhood scale, UHIs vary widely with surface temperatures found to be 2-3 °C hotter than the urban mean for areas with maximized pavement, or up to 6 °C cooler for areas with heavy vegetation. Vegetation modifies the urban energy balance primarily through direct shading and evaporative cooling (Marchionni, Revelli, & Daly, 2019). Tree canopies can reflect solar radiation upward away from the canopy and prevent energy from being stored, while evaporative cooling is achieved through energy diverted to evapotranspiration (ET).…”

“…These results add to a large body of literature finding that urban green spaces can reduce the UHI effect at various spatial and temporal scales. However, the majority of previous studies are at the scale of urban forest or parks (Marchionni et al, 2019). As research in a single courtyard is limited, the right terminology doesn't exist to describe the cooling index of different vegetation configurations at this scale, hence, we use vegetation cooling index (VCI) as a microclimate assessment of the role of vegetation within the urban environment.…”