Review of the Relationship Between Urban Runoff Pollutant and Catchment Characteristics

A lot of research has been done to determine levels of contamination in runoff from urban and rural catchment areas. Some authors compare their results with other authors, or look for relationships between the variations of pollutant concentration and the catchment characteristics but they seldom focus on determining the statistical significance of their results. This paper presents a review of 37 papers selected from a total of 169 papers consulted about runoff water quality throughout the world (America, Asia and Europe). The results presented in these 37 papers have been reviewed and statistically analyzed in order to evaluate the influence of catchment area characteristics (location, catchment area size, average daily traffic and type of land use) on the stormwater runoff pollution. It has been concluded that for the cases studied, most of the results about the polluting agents studied are comparable and no important element of the catchment characteristics had significant influence on the pollutants' concentration.