Shallow Groundwater Mapping to Improve Stormwater Management in Coastal Plain Communities

East Carolina University will lead a research project to pilot the use of publicly-available data (LiDAR, soil surveys) to locate unmapped stormwater features and estimate the depth of the water table in the City of Greenville, NC. The research team, which includes expertise in GIS, soils, stormwater, and groundwater, will use previously installed monitoring wells and develop a broader surficial aquifer monitoring network to map the shallow groundwater table. This observed data will be compared to estimates of water table depths from the easily accessible spatial data. Results will be used to evaluate interactions between shallow groundwater and stormwater infrastructure, identify systems that are currently stressed by high groundwater levels, and identify zones that are appropriate for specific types of stormwater retrofit activities. This project will provide a jurisdiction-wide map of stormwater infrastructure, high and low water tables, and potential retrofit approaches for the City of Greenville and a low-cost approach to map the shallow groundwater table that can be applied by other coastal plain communities.

Scholars @ ECU