Urban Storm Flooding: Characteristics and Management in Beijing

Abstract

Beijing is located on the North China Plain with five rivers, which belong to the Hai River Basin. Its continental monsoon climate with uneven precipitation distribution is extreme likely lead to serious urban flood disasters. According to the disaster results, urban storm flood in Beijing can be classified into four types. Here typical extreme storm flood events and their characteristics in Beijing were analyzed in detail. It showed that storm flood events in recently decades had a trend, which centered in a relatively small area with high intensity and short duration. The main reasons of urban storm flood disaster were urbanization and basic facilities with low flood and drainage standard. Urbanization means land utilization significantly altering hydraulic processes, and extreme storm can easily exceed those facilities capacity. In order to deal with urban storm flood, Beijing government have taken four measurements, which were upgrading and reconstruction of rainwater pumping stations, improving projects of small and medium rivers, building sponge city, and implementing the West Suburb Storm-water Regulation Project. In addition, the flood warning and emergency management system has been established. Furthermore, some measurements were pointed to be done in the future, including improvement of the flood control management system, improvement of flood control plans, strengthening flood warning system, and strengthening social management and public awareness of flood prevention. With these improvements of management and engineering measurements, it can be more secure under intensive storms in Beijing. These experiences of flood control in Beijing can provide references for other cities.

Understanding the Use of Heterogenous Data in Tackling Urban Flooding: An Integrative Literature Review

“…Qualitative studies usually discuss urban flooding causes from a theoretical point of view [53][54][55][56] without data collection or analysis, they or study public perceptions through questionnaire and focus group analysis [57].…”

Development of an Integrated Urban Flood Model and Its Application in a Concave-Down Overpass Area

“…This influence is greatly intensified in urban areas experiencing accelerated urbanization processes [1,2]. In downtown Beijing, China, the current urbanization rate exceeds 86%, and many concave-down overpasses were built with underpasses 2-3 m lower than their surrounding areas [3]. These underpasses of concave-down overpasses are artificial "converging water basins" where large inundated areas can be generated quickly during extreme rainfall events [4,5].…”

Algae control in oligotrophic surface water under the joint effect of nutritional competition and microbial algae-lytic substances

“…The project has improved the ecological environment of this area. 10,11 However, stormwater has poor water mobility and weak reoxygenation energy, leading to eutrophication and other environmental problems. 12 The algae density varies with season, even when sampling in autumn, the algae density reached 2.21 × 10 7 cells per L, with Scenedesmus and Chlorella being dominant.…”