"Because of the growth in urbanism, professionals in the environmental industry are often tasked with designing strategies to accommodate urban development while minimizing environmental impact (Selbig & Bannerman, 2008). Converting the natural landscape into residential or commercial developments can drastically alter its hydrologic characteristics (Selbig & Bannerman, 2008). This study compares an existing undeveloped site along the Los Angeles River (scenario 1) with two design scenarios. One design is the city's conceptual plan, referred to as a Mia Lehrer and Associates Design (design scenario 3). The second design incorporates low impact design elements, referred to as the Extended LID Design (design scenario 2). Using these three scenarios and the EPA stormwater calculator, runoff, infiltration, and evaporation will be measured to determine which design is most effective along these three parameters. The Friedman's One Way of Variance Test was applied to the treatments in order to determine which design was most successful concerning stormwater management. The results show that the design with LID controls are significantly greater than the existing conditions (p>= 0.005). These results are important because they show that LID controls are beneficial to site design when stormwater management is a concern. These findings also show that it is important to investigate low impact development for future sites and can raise awareness within the engineering community."--Page ii.
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