Rain gardens – case study of potential locations identification using GIS

Abstract

Rain gardens represent a method of storm water treatment at settlement level, where, besides the ecological aspect, they fulfil the aesthetic function in public spaces. Their concept and proposal follows several rules under the natural conditions and site parameters itself. The aim of study was the establishment of methodology for determining the possible locations for the installation of the rain gardens, in application to chosen settlement – village Žirany, Nitra district. Selection of potential sites is based on the attributes of soil properties, slope, land use, ownership and ground water level in the given area, that are processed in GIS software QGIS. The elaboration of the methodology is based on existing analyses in last years. The result of applied methodology is raster map which describes the suitability of sites for rain garden installation in selected village based on the spatial analysis with the use of overlaying of the value raster of the mentioned attributes. Area of fields with best conditions for raingarden placement is approx. 9700 m2 (0.86% of cadastral area of surveyed village Žirany).

Keywords

• rain garden
• water management
• storm water
• GIS analysis