Urban Ecohydrology: Nature-inspired solutions for urban water management, Canada

Project Overview

The demosite offers access to streams, lakes, and wetlands, as well as stormwater ponds, bioretention cells, and other blue-green management practices in urban and peri-urban landscapes. Demosite users benefit from the technical expertise, research facilities, and knowledge mobilization capacity of the University of Waterloo’s Water Institute (https://uwaterloo.ca/water-institute/).

Conserve Process YES

Enhance Process YES

Apply Complementary NO

Ecosystem Services

Provisioning

Provisioning Services are ecosystem services that describe the material or energy outputs from ecosystems. They include food, water and other resources.

Regulating

Regulating Services are the services that ecosystems provide by acting as regulators eg. regulating the quality of air and soil or by providing flood and disease control.

Habitat / Supporting

Ecosystem services "that are necessary for the production of all other ecosystem services". These include services such as nutrient recycling, primary production and soil formation.

Cultural

Cultural Services corresponds nonmaterial benefits people obtain from ecosystems through spiritual enrichment, cognitive development, reflection, recreation, and aesthetic experiences.

Major Issues

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No issues provided.

EH Engineering Solutions

Ongoing applied research investigates the role of

Ongoing applied research investigates the role of vegetation surrounding stormwater ponds and planted in bioretention cells in co-sequestering nutrients and CO2

An engineering firm is partnering with the

An engineering firm is partnering with the research project to tune the hydraulics of bioretention systems to ecosystem service delivery targets

Ongoing applied research focuses on biogeochemical interventions

Ongoing applied research focuses on biogeochemical interventions in existing stormwater management systems that improve carbon and nutrient sequestration and GHG reductions (pond design and maintenance regime, amendments, bioremediation).

Project Activities

Flow and water level monitoring
Sampling for water quality and molecular biology analyses
Sediment and soil coring for geochemical analyses
Greenhouse gas flux measurements
Vegetation surveys

Expected Outcomes

Identified the mechanisms of phosphorus retention in bioretention systems | Linked urban lake salinization to eutrophication symptoms | Quantified microplastics accumulation in stormwater ponds | Developed SWMM models for urban catchments of the demosite | First GHG flux measurements carried out.

Latest Results

No results provided yet.

Ecohydrology Principles and Solutions

Hydrological Quantification

Quantification of the hydrological processes at catchment scale and mapping the impacts

Ecological Identification

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Ecological Engineering & Nature-based Solutions

Ongoing applied research investigates the role of vegetation surrounding stormwater ponds and planted in bioretention cells in co-sequestering nutrients and CO2 | An engineering firm is partnering with the research project to tune the hydraulics of bioretention systems to ecosystem service delivery targets | Ongoing applied research focuses on biogeochemical interventions in existing stormwater management systems that improve carbon and nutrient sequestration and GHG reductions (pond design and maintenance regime, amendments, bioremediation).

Objectives

EH Objectives

Water 4/5

Biodiversity 3/5

Services 3/5

Resilience 4/5

Cultural Heritage 0/5

Project Objectives

Culture, The demosite locations are in urban areas that are highly multicultural with a large recent immigrant population. Local community engagement and citizen science involvement are therefore an integral part of the demosite-supported research activities. Education, We are collaborating with a high school science and technology program, as well as a local community organization in Milton, Ontario, to engage high school students, and involved in their community, in citizen science and environmental monitoring. Policy, The design of stormwater ponds and other urban stormwater infrastructure are regulated by the Ontario government’s Stormwater Management Planning and Design Manual.

Key Stakeholders

University of Waterloo Wilfrid Laurier University University of Toronto University of Guelph Environment and Climate Change Canada Toronto Region Conservation Authority Credit Valley Conservation City of Kitchener Regional Municipality of Waterloo City of Richmond Hill Town of Ajax Ontario Clean Water Association Environmental Defence Muslim Families Association – Blue Dot Stewards program CF Crozier & Associates Consulting Engineers Water Institute (University of Waterloo)

Methodology

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