Rain gardens

From LID SWM Planning and Design Guide
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This article is about planted installations designed to capture surface runoff in an amended soil.
For more highly engineered systems, see Bioretention cells.

Schematic illustrating the components of a rain garden.

thumb|Disconnected downspout routing water into a rain garden.

Overview[edit]

Rain gardens capture roof, lawn and driveway runoff from low to medium density residential lots. These can be simple gardens constructed by the homeowner as a retrofit, or they can be professionally designed into a residential development.

Rain gardens are ideal for:

  • Capturing the flow from disconnected downspouts
  • Community design/build projects for raising awareness about stormwater capture and functional landscapes

The fundamental components of a rain garden are:

  • An amended soil mix
  • Suitable planting

Additional components may include:

  • A splash pad of rocks to prevent the downspout flow from eroding the soil
  • An overflow channel to another are of garden

Planning Considerations[edit]

Design[edit]

Incentives and Credits[edit]

In Ontario

See Also[edit]

External Links[edit]