650 - Enhancing Stormwater Management: Climate Data Sources and Methodologies for Informed Decision-Making

Properly managing the quantity of stormwater is essential to avoid infrastructure damage and ensure road safety. Climate change has emerged as a critical challenge to the sustainable development of transportation infrastructure stormwater management systems. As global temperatures rise and extreme weather events become more frequent and intense, transportation networks face increased vulnerability to flooding, erosion, and structural damage. Researchers have been working to quantify such impacts from climate change with urban development and urban stormwater infrastructure as case studies which can be easily translated to transportation projects. Understanding current research on climate impacts on stormwater management is vital for engineers as it enables them to develop resilient and sustainable infrastructure. With climate change influencing precipitation patterns and intensities, informed decisions can lead to effective drainage systems, minimizing flooding risks, protecting ecosystems, and enhancing overall infrastructure resilience. Hence in order to provide understanding of the progress, this research paper provides a critical review of the methodologies used to study climate change and its impact on stormwater runoff. Sources of projected climate data and how they are downscaled and used are also reviewed. Finally, it identifies and summarizes future research needs. Findings of this presentation are expected to help engineers and public agencies in identifying sources of projected climate and make informed decisions regarding sensitivity of the data.