Urban Drainage Planning and Design in Mekelle City, Ethiopia

Proper urban drainage management is core to safely discharge flood generated within an urban center or from external sources in to final receiving systems (natural water ways/rivers) or to encourage on-site infiltration. With urbanization it is true that flood hazard increases due to the fact that imperviousness (roofing, transportation ways, parking lots) increases which reduces the infiltration capacity of the land. Similarly with the establishment of Mekelle city, flood generation became a core problem as a result of deforestation followed by impervious structures & it is with such problems the provision of urban drainage facilities had started. According to evidences, such activities had started with road construction. Since then the municipality has tried its best to provide drainage facilities in different periods of time. But, generally, urban drainage management in the city has concentrated only on conventional management. To reverse the situation, this study has tried to introduce sustainable urban drainage management technologies to reduce land degradation, river bank erosion,urban utilities degradation,natural water ways pollution & siltation to end the problem.