PROLIFERATION OF STORMWATER PONDS IN THE COASTAL PLAIN AREAS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN U.S. PRESENTS CRITICAL RESEARCH NEEDS

Urban development is leading to increased reliance on various types of best management practices to mitigate flooding and water quality concerns, and in the southeastern U.S. coastal plain, stormwater ponds are the most common type of BMP. Ponds can also provide ecological habitat for birds and aquatic life, sequester carbon, and can serve as a valued, aesthetic feature of a community. They therefore are a public good, albeit often privately owned and managed. Managers perceive ponds as a defense between terrestrial runoff and receiving water bodies, whereas the public may consider them amenities for their community. Ponds may be designed to trap or attenuate pollutants, but observations show they can also be pollutant incubators and sources. How ponds perform influence whether they are viewed as environmental assets or liabilities. We emphasize that stormwater ponds are an engineered landscape feature with implications for the social and ecological systems of the southeastern U.S. that require further multidisciplinary study. The case for recognizing stormwater infrastructure as a social-ecological system has been made recently by others, and this region offers a unique hydrogeologic, ecologic, and socio-political setting to study this framework. Some critical research needs include: evaluating stormwater pond performance under varying hydrologic regimes (alone or in combination with other BMPs or retrofits); upscaling stormwater pond science and transferring science into practice; and leveraging social-ecological frameworks for advancing management of stormwater pond infrastructure. In the dynamic and rapidly-developing coastal zone of the southeastern U.S., combining knowledge areas with a systems perspective is crucially needed.