Mapping Urban Water Balance to support the integrated design of water cycles in the peri-urban areas

Abstract

The paper tests the effectiveness of a methodology used to analyze the water element in the urban context, in supporting design choices oriented toward sustainable water management. In particular, it presents a mapping technique of the variables used for calculating the UWB (Urban Water Balance) using the open data available for Milan. The methodology is applied to a peri-urban area of the city’s southern outskirts, the Corvetto/Chiaravalle district. The availability of the data has allowed identifying the minimum spatial area on which to carry out a balance of water flows using open-source GIS in the census block (CB). The methodology’s effectiveness in supporting the design choices was verified on two specific census blocks, the first representing the diffuse residential built area, the second an existing farmhouse no longer productive with residential functions. The main design strategy’s goal was to reduce water withdrawal from the aqueduct and reuse part of the outgoing water to limit the discharge into the sewage system as much as possible.