Understanding Stormwater Management

Hollywood Beautification Team has, since 1992, been at the forefront of educating Los Angeles citizens to know more about environmental conservation and improvement. In the course of their duties, volunteers have served communities through tree planting, educational workshops to youths at risk, and general improvement of school campuses and neighborhoods. Hollywood Beautification Team plants over 1,500 trees each year, removes two million square feet of graffiti and, participates in water conservation efforts, including stormwater conservation and management.

Stormwater management is the effort to lower runoff from     or melted ice that finds its way on the streets of major towns and cities. When there is a lack of a proper strategy to deal with stormwater, it can run on the surface, picking up debris, chemicals, eroded soil, bacteria, and other pollutants in rivers, lakes, streams, and wetlands. Urban areas have many pavements that prevent water from naturally being absorbed into the ground and instead, goes to storm drains, sewers and, drainage systems, causing floods.

Stormwater can be managed using various techniques such as a catch basin. These features form part of the storm drain system whose work is to ensure water doesn’t accumulate in fields, roads, parking lots and, other surfaces. A catch basin insert refers to a device placed in a storm drain to facilitate quality water treatment. The goal is to get rid of contaminants such as debris, litter, oil, and grease, as well as coarse sediment.

The inserts rely on a strainer and catch basin filters to get rid of all unwanted debris. This pre-treatment technique ensures stormwater runoff is safe from pollutants which promote environmental conservation. Catch basins and filters are best installed during the initial system construction to avoid pollution of key natural resources and cause water to fail quality standards.