Impact of SWMM Catchment Discretization

Journal of Hydrologic Engineering.
Submitted March 28, 2012; accepted December 21, 2012;

posted ahead of print December 26, 2012. doi:10.1061/(ASCE)HE.1943-5584.0000777
Title:
Impact of SWMM Catchment Discretization: A Case Study in Syracuse, NY
Authors:
Downloaded from ascelibrary.org by UNIVERSIDADE DE BRASILIA on 05/31/13. Copyright ASCE. For personal use only; all rights reserved.
Ning Sun a, Myrna Hall b, Bongghi Hong c, LianJun Zhang d
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a
The Graduate Program in Environmental Science, State University of New York,
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College of Environmental Science and Forestry (SUNY-ESF), 1 Forestry Drive,
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Syracuse, NY 13210-2778, Email: nsun@esf.edu
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b
Department of Environmental Studies, SUNY-ESF, 1 Forestry Drive, Syracuse, NY
13210-2778, Email: mhhall@esf.edu.

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c
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, 103 Little
Rice, Ithaca, NY, 14850, Email: bh43@cornell.edu.

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d
Department of Forest and Natural Resources Management, SUNY-ESF, 1 Forestry
Drive, Syracuse, NY 13210-2778, Email: lizhang@esf.edu.

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Corresponding Author:
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Myrna Hall, Email: mhhall@esf.edu.

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Key Words:
SWMM, Discretization, Parameterization, GLUE, Uncertainty, Calibration,
Validation
Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

J. Hydrol. Eng.
Journal of Hydrologic Engineering. Submitted March 28, 2012; accepted December 21, 2012;
Abstract
This study examined how the level of catchment discretization influenced the
model parameterization and output uncertainty of the Storm Water Management
Model (SWMM) 5.0. We developed two catchment delineations for a highly

urbanized sewershed in Syracuse, NY: 1) the macro-scale model containing a
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minimum required number of subcatchments to retain the original sewer network
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properties, and 2) the micro-scale model in which each subcatchment was defined for
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a unique soil and land use combination. For both scales, we calibrated the model
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parameters and quantified the uncertainty of model outputs using the Generalized
Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) methodology. Then we applied calibrated

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posterior parameter sets at micro and macro scales individually to a second
sewershed, which was also delineated at both micro and macro scales, to test observed
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versus simulated flows. The results indicated that the catchment disaggregation level
had a great impact on both parameterization and simulation results, and that the
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majority of the parameters were sensitive to the modeling scales. Overall, the
posterior parameters calibrated based on the micro delineation resulted in a higher

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degree of reduction in output uncertainties for both calibrated and validated
sewersheds. Hence we argue that the calibrated parameters obtained, based upon the
macro delineation, would result in reduced confidence in simulated runoff for another
site unique in its characteristics, while the posterior parameters derived from the
micro delineation could provide a higher confidence level in terms of parameter
transferability for modeling other, particularly ungaged sites.

J. Hydrol. Eng.
1. Introduction
1.1 Combined Sewer Overflows
Urban sprawl over the last three decades has induced an expansion of impervious
areas accompanied by more frequent occurrences of sewer overflow events in cities

where sanitary and storm sewers share a main sewer line. Instead of letting rain water
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run its pre-developed natural courses, the water flowing off city surfaces is connected
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directly to the combined storm sewer system through pipes and gutters in most urban
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settings. Combined sewer overflows (CSOs) occur when stormwater runoff exceeds
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infrastructure capacity. This normally is caused by large rainfall events. The CSO is
released into neighboring surface waters, and the resulting effluent pollutes receiving
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waters and poses a considerable threat to aquatic life, human health and groundwater
quality (Grigg, 1996). A major challenge of urban stormwater management is to

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design effective and efficient stormwater control facilities and hydraulic structures
that can handle peak flows and hence reduce CSO events. In practice, the design
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parameters of these facilities are generally derived from the actual hydrograph
developed based on the measurements of historical storm events. Flow records,

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however, are often not available for estimating these design parameters because of
sparsely installed flow meters that are used to measure stormwater runoff from urban
sewersheds. To overcome this problem, hydrologic models are often used to simulate
storm hydrographs and provide discharge estimates at ungaged sites. On the other side,
hydrologic models cannot be calibrated or validated without flow measurements,

J. Hydrol. Eng.
however, which indicates significantly overlooked uncertainty associated with applied
model parameters and flow predictions.
1.2 Issues with Model Scales
More than a quarter century ago, Huber et al. (1975) presented the possible
catchment discretization methods, a “fine” versus “coarse” discretization, for the
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Northwood section of Baltimore, Maryland. Zaghloul (1981) suggested using a finite
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set of area- or length-weighted parameters to represent the spatially varying physical
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properties of continuous spaces. This is also known as the spatially lumped-parameter
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approach to hydrological modeling. Since then, the majority of hydrological models
used in practice today are lumped parameter models (Butts et al., 2004). This method
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is widely used because it requires fewer input data and is more computationally
efficient than a model based on spatial units of a fine resolution. However, the lumped
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hydrological modeling approach does not explicitly account for the heterogeneity of
surface properties (e.g., variation of land covers, soils, slopes and etc.) that influence
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how water moves through the landscape. It is also very difficult to represent the
complexity of flow paths mathematically at a coarse scale. Because physical

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hydrological processes are characterized by strong nonlinearity, Moore and Gallant
(1991) argued that it may well be impossible to use the lumped value of spatially
variable parameters to represent the mean hydrologic response related to catchment
characteristics. Beven (1989) suggested that future development in physically based
(hydrological) modeling must take into account the lumping effect of subgrid scale
processes. An alternative to the lumped-parameter model is the distributed-parameter

J. Hydrol. Eng.
model, which ideally considers all spatial variability of the landscape by solving the
governing equation within each spatially-defined landscape unit (Baker, 1989; Chow
et al., 1988). It is important to note that any so called “lumped” model is rarely
entirely lumped, and so may be considered a partially “distributed” model. The model
scale, lumped or distributed, is relative to the size of the study area, scale of the input
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dataset, model complexity, and etc. The constraints of distributed-parameter models
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result from the model complexity in terms of model structure and requirements for
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inputs. Consequently, the choice of modeling scale has always been a dilemma. Few
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past studies examined the impact of modeling scale on distributed hydrologic model
performance. Mamillapalli et al. (1996) found that, using the Soil and Water
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Assessment Tool (SWAT), simulated streamflow predictions varied with the number
of subwatersheds used to divide the watershed. Discretization of Hubbard Brook

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Watershed 6, New Hampshire into 208 cells led to an improvement in streamflow and
nutrient flux estimation simulated with Simple Nitrogen Cycle (SINIC) model (Hong
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et al., 2006). Barco et al. (2008) applied the SWMM model coupled with GIS
procedures to simulate runoff for a large urban catchment in Southern California, and
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employed the ‘complex method’ in multi-objective optimization to estimate four
SWMM runoff parameters. The results demonstrated that integrating GIS and a
stormwater model with a constrained optimization technique can be applied to large
watersheds. The results from Guo and Urbonas (2008), and Dankenbring and Mays
(2009) demonstrated that successive catchment discretization in the Storm Water
Management Model (SWMM) caused increasing predicted peak flows. Ghosh and

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Hellweger (2012) investigated the effects of spatial resolution on SWMM model
predictions in an urban catchment using the Artificial Network Generator (ANGel).
However, these studies were conducted in a deterministic fashion without taking the
uncertainty issues into consideration. Uncertainties or errors associated with model

structure and model parameterization can propagate to the model outputs. Thus it is
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desirable and necessary to integrate such uncertainties into the modeling processes in
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order to quantify the overall uncertainty in model outputs. The Generalized
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Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) methodology, developed by Beven and
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Binley (1992), is a widely adopted approach to evaluate model uncertainties
particularly for nonlinear hydrologic models. Recent research that demonstrated

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applications of the GLUE procedure in rainfall-runoff models can be found in Beven
and Binley (1992), Lamb et al. (1998), Blazkova et al. (2002), Hong et al. (2005),
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Choi and Beven (2007), Fang and Ball (2007), and Xiong and O’Connor (2008).
The research reported here focused on three questions: 1) how would model
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outputs and parameter values respond to changing model scale? 2) Is there any scale
dependence of the control parameters? 3) Do the parameters calibrated from finer

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catchment delineation in one catchment lead to better model performance in another
catchment? To answer these questions, we developed two catchment delineations with
different discretization levels, i.e., micro and macro scale. For both catchment
delineations, we ran the SWMM model and quantified the uncertainties of model
predictions using the GLUE methodology. We had the measured hydrographs from
sewershed outlets available to us, which allowed us to calibrate the model parameters

J. Hydrol. Eng.
and test parameter transferability through model validation. The ultimate goal of this
study was to investigate urban runoff modeling techniques and provide better
estimates of sewer hydrographs, particularly for ungaged sites.
2. Methods
2.1 SWMM Parameterization
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SWMM is a physically based, spatially distributed model for simulating all
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aspects of hydrologic and water quality cycles primarily within urban areas (Huber et
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al., 1988; Rossman, 2010). SWMM treats each catchment as a nonlinear reservoir and
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employs the combined continuity equation (1) and Manning’s equation (2) on each
subcatchment (Huber et al., 1988). Here a subcatchment is defined as an area of land

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containing its own fraction of pervious and impervious surfaces whose runoff drains
to an outlet point, which could be either a storm drain or another subcatchment

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(Rossman, 2010).
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(1)
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where V is the volume of water on the subcatchment, dt is the computational time

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step, A denotes the area of the subcatchment, ie is the effective inflow, and Q is the
subcatchment outflow, derived as follows:
(2)
where W denotes the subcatchment width, k is a conversion constant equal to 1.486
for U.S. metric units or 1.0 for SI units, n is the Manning’s roughness coefficient, DS
is the surface depression storage, and S is the subcatchment slope.

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The input parameters of physical process-based models such as SWMM often
correspond to the interpretable physical properties of the site. As geographic
information systems (GIS) has been increasingly linked with SWMM for data pre-
processing and model parameterization, the majority of the SWMM control

parameters can be extracted from spatially defined GIS layers, e.g. catchment area
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and slope. The principal measured SWMM parameters are presented in Table 1.
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Ideally, every SWMM parameter would be developed based on actual measurements
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of catchment characteristics. In practice, however, some parameters with a high
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degree of spatial variability cannot be directly measured or extracted from GIS layers,
and, hereafter will be referred to as inferred parameters. Previous studies either

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developed empirical relationships from which these parameters could be inferred
based on obtainable measurements, or established the ranges for the parameter values
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through statistical approaches, or lab or field experiments. The inferred parameters
are rarely well-defined due to model scale issues and the spatially and temporally
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varying meteorological and geographical conditions under which the models were
built. In this study, based upon the actual sewer hydrographs, we aimed to refine the
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following inferred overland flow parameters including Manning’s n and depression
storage (DS) for each surface cover, the coefficient for subcatchment width (KWidth),
and Manning's n for closed conduit (nConduit). Manning’s n, often called the surface
roughness coefficient, determines the overland runoff rate from a subcatchment. A
greater n value results in a lower runoff rate and prolongs the flow duration. DS is the
volume of water that can be held in natural depressions in the land surface (Horton,

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1935). In other words, DS represents the depth of water that has to be exceeded on the
subcatchment before runoff occurs. A relatively small value of DS indicates less
rainfall retention capacity in a subcatchment, and subsequently leads to higher peak
flow rates and earlier occurrence of runoff. Manning’s n and DS are difficult to
measure because of the complexity and variability in surface covers in an urban
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context. Subcatchment width (W), conceptually, represents the width of the
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downstream side of the idealized sloping rectangular subcatchment (Huber et al.,
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1988). A smaller W is equivalent to a longer flow path, leading to the attenuated peak
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flow occurrence. Since real-world subcatchments are mostly irregular in shape with
drainage channels off the center, it can be very difficult to determine the actual
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subcatchment width. We therefore adopted the equation used in the InfoSWMM User
Manual (MWH Soft Inc., 2005):

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(3)
where W is computed as a ratio (KWidth) of the square root of subcatchment area. We

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chose to use so the estimated flow width was less sensitive to the actual
subcatchment width (particularly important when the subcatchment has a very large
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width), as opposed to the method suggested in the SWMM applications manual
(Gironás et al., 2009): W = A/ L, where L denotes a conceptual constant maximum
overland flow length. The parameter nConduit is an indicator of the smoothness of
interior pipe walls, and determines the volume of water a pipe can convey (i.e., its
hydraulic capacity). The lower nConduit the smoother the wall, hence the greater is the
hydraulic capacity of the pipe. Although nConduit can be measured directly, it seldom

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is, due to the fact that numerous studies have been done to establish a range of
Manning’s n values for various types of pipes. Nevertheless, the selection of the
nConduit value is a rather arbitrary process.
In this study, the kinematic wave method (Lighthill and Whitham, 1955) was
chosen for the channel flow routing. The runoff from subcatchments was computed at
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a 5-minute time step, while the computational time used for flow routings was set to
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30 seconds. Compared to the diffusive wave method, the kinematic wave method
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substitutes the simple stage-discharge relationship for the momentum equation by
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assuming that the bed slope is approximately equal to the friction slope and stage-
discharge (MacArthur and DeVries, 1993). As urban conveyance facilities, such as

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pipes, are usually designed for partially full flow conditions, the kinematic wave
method is considered appropriate for simulating the movement of stormwater over

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small urban basins (Overton and Meadows. 1976). It is also important to bear in mind
that the diffusion wave equation is more suitable than the kinematic wave method for
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the milder slopes (0.001–0.0001) (Kazezyılmaz-Alhan et al., 2005; Kazezyılmaz-
Alhan and Medina, 2007).

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2.2 Multi-scale Catchment Delineations
We developed two catchment delineations, one at the micro and one at the macro
scale, to test how much the model outputs are influenced by the aggregation level, or
scale, of input data. The two scales differ in the aggregation level of subcatchments
and the flow routing element settings. The routing element of each subcatchment is
comprised of two main components: outlet and internal subarea routing. The outlet
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(either another subcatchment or a storm drain) receives runoff from a subcatchment,
and is represented by a user-specified flow direction. If a subcatchment contains both
impervious and pervious subareas, internal subarea routing specifies the runoff
direction within the subcatchment, i.e., impervious to pervious subarea or pervious to

impervious subarea.
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2.2.1 The Micro-scale Delineation
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The micro-scale model aims to reduce heterogeneity within each subcatchment of
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the sewershed in order to better replicate the heterogeneity across the sewershed and
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thus reduce model uncertainty. Each subcatchment has a unique soil and land cover
combination and is treated as a distinct entity or hydrologic response unit (HRU) as

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defined by Leavesley and Stannard (1990). The hydrologic response is simulated
within each subcatchment. Due to the homogeneity of each subcatchment, the micro
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delineation can represent better the actual hydrologic behavior of different surface
covers. Slope variance within the subcatchment, however, could not be captured due
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to the scale of the input digital elevation model (DEM), hence we used the average
slope for each subcatchment.

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2.2.2 The Macro-scale Delineation
The subcatchment boundaries for the macro-scale delineation were developed by
overlaying the surface cover map with the sewer network map, and the sewer network
was preserved with the original level of detail. The majority of subcatchments
contain more than one surface cover type. The subarea routing direction within the
subcatchment was manually determined based on landscape slope and connectivity,
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and the percent of runoff routed between subareas was assumed 100% for all
subcatchments. Within each subcatchment, all inferred parameters of interest were
calculated from an area-weighted average of existing surface conditions defined by
the micro-scale model.

2.3 Study Site and Input Data
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Two urban sewersheds located in the City of Syracuse, NY were used in this
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study, CSO 027 for calibration and CSO 044 for validation (Figure 1). CSO 027,
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46.76 hectares in size, is comprised of 68.4% impervious surfaces, 18% tree cover
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and 13.6% lawns as viewed from aerial photography (Table 2). In CSO 044, 52.2% of
the total 17.75 hectares is covered by impervious surfaces, 21.3% is covered by trees,
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and the rest 26.5% is lawns. We defined impervious surfaces as all paved roads and
streets, sidewalks, rooftops, and parking lots, and assumed an identical hydrological
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response from all impervious surfaces. Lawns and trees account for all pervious
surfaces in both sites. No adjustment is made for tree canopy over impervious
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surfaces.
CSO 027 and CSO 044 were both delineated on micro and macro scales. The
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macro-scale CSO 027 consisted of 70 subcatchments while the micro-scale
delineation contained 292 subcatchments (Figure 2). The macro-scale CSO 044
contained 19 subcatchments and the micro-scale CSO 044 was partitioned into 478
homogeneous subcatchments (Figure 3). The GIS layers used to prepare SWMM
input parameters included the Digital Elevation Model (DEM), the soil map, the
sewershed surface cover map that we digitized from the sewershed orthoimages, and
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the sewer network map (all described in Table 3). We employed the SCS Curve
Number Method (USDA SCS, 1986) for infiltration estimations. The hydrologic soil
group (HSG) map derived from the 30-m soil map (NRCS, 2010) was overlaid with
the surface cover map to determine the curve number for each surface cover
according to the table “Runoff Curve Numbers for Urban Area” (USDA SCS, 1986).
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This method was selected because it is conceptually simple, has less intensive
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parameterization requirements, yet provides reliable estimates of infiltration rates
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(Bales and Betson, 1982; Xiong and Melching, 2005). Additionally, the curve number
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method can easily incorporate changing land uses and covers in hydrologic modeling.
The 5-min rainfall data, daily temperature and monthly evaporation data from a
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nearby weather station provided the model meteorological inputs. The selected storm
events used in model calibration and validation are presented in Table 4. The
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monitored 5-minute combined sanitary-storm flows from August through October,
2009 at the two sewersheds, CSO 027 and CSO 044, were provided by Onondaga
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County consultants, CH2MHill. The data were used for model calibration and
validation. We developed a baseline hydrograph at each sewershed outlet, which

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represents the sanitary flow contribution only. To do this we adjusted the sanitary
hydrograph based on evaluation of the empirical time patterns (monthly, daily,
hourly) of human water use. The adjustment factors were derived from the collected
5-minute sanitary inflow data during dry weather conditions. A full description of the
method can be found in Rossman (2010).
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2.4 Model Calibration and Validation Procedure
We applied GLUE in model calibration and validation to incorporate the sources
of uncertainties for inputs and outputs. GLUE uses a likelihood function to measure
the goodness-of-fit between simulated and observed data and produces credible limits
for model input parameters and simulated outputs for a given uncertainty level
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(Beven, 2006). A full mathematical description can be found in Beven and Binley
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(1992), Lamb et al. (1998), Hong et al. (2005). The steps for the calibration and
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validation procedures are briefly described as follows.
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A uniform prior distribution was assumed for each parameter over a sufficiently
wide range of parameter values (Table 5). We ran SWMM for the micro/macro CSO
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027 delineation using 25,000 sample parameter sets drawn from the prior distribution
using a Monte Carlo technique. From this the prior output distributions were
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generated. We then computed a “goodness-of-fit” measure P (i.e., likelihood) for each
of the 25,000 simulations against total flows measured from each of the selected rain
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events using the Gaussian distribution function. The selection of rainfall events was
based on the observed continuous hydrographs. The lag time between the selected events
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had to be long enough so that the events could be considered independent from one another
(Table 4). In each instance the runoff from a previous event had returned to base flow,
meaning that the contribution of the direct runoff generated from the previous storm events to
the hydrograph was negligible when the following storm event started. The likelihood
function was then updated using Bayes’ theorem (Box and Tiao, 1992) when
observed peak flow rates were added as a new dataset:
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(4)
where D denotes observed data (DQ for observed total flow volume and DP for
observed peak flow rate); θ denotes model parameter sets; θQ is simulated total flow
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volume and θP is simulated peak flow rate; SQ and SP is the standard deviation of
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observed total flows and peak flow rates, respectively; i is numbered rainfall event
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and n is the total number of events. Note that the underlying assumption of applying
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the Gaussian distribution function (Equation 4) is that the total flow and peak flow
data are independent of each other. The Gaussian likelihood function was used here in
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order to approximate the true form of posterior probability distributions under the
implicit assumption of error distribution and data independence. Based on the

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likelihood values obtained from Equation (4), we applied the sampling/importance
resampling (SIR) algorithm (Rubin, 1987, 1988) to generate the posterior probability
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distributions for each inferred parameter of interest and the uncertainty bounds for
runoff predictions. Subsequently, we compared the posterior parameter distribution

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and flow uncertainty bounds for the micro- and macro- CSO 027 to test how
parameter values and model outputs would respond to the changing model scale.
To examine whether or not there is scale dependence of any inferred parameters
of interest, we applied the first-order sensitivity method (Saltelli, 2002) at both model
scales. This method quantifies the interactions between input parameters and
identifies the relative influence of each input parameter on the model output
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uncertainty (Saltelli et al., 2000). The fundamental equation used to compute the
fractional contribution (IX) of each model input parameter θX to the total variance of
model outputs (Y) is:
(5)
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The sum of IX closer to one indicates less interaction among the parameters. A higher
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IX value represents higher sensitivity, indicating greater influence on the model output
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from changes in an individual parameter (Saltelli, 2004).
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Finally, we conducted two same-scale and two cross-scale model validation runs
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to identify whether finer scale catchment parameterization produces better model
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performance when transported to another catchment. The model validation was based
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on the assumption that DS and Manning’s n for impervious surfaces, tree and lawns,
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KWidth and nConduit were the same from one catchment to the other. Two same-scale
validations include: the posterior parameters derived from the micro CSO 027 were
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applied on the micro delineations of the second watershed CSO 044 to simulate the
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flows, and the parameters from the macro CSO 027 applied on the macro CSO 044.
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Conversely, parameters from the macro-scale CSO 027 applied on the micro CSO 044
and parameters derived from the micro-scale CSO 027 applied on the macro CSO 044
comprise the cross-scale model validations. The simulation results were validated
against the measurements taken at the CSO 044 outlet under storm events of varying
magnitude.
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3. Result and Discussion
3.1 Parameter Calibration for CSO 027
We obtained over 1300 posterior parameter sets with unique values for both
delineations using the SIR approach. This number was considered as a sufficient
sample of parameter sets to provide a reasonable estimate of the posterior distribution
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(Bates et al, 2000; Lamb et al. 1998; Xiong and O’Connor, 2008). The posterior
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parameter distributions generated from the macro CSO 027 delineation were
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compared with those from the micro delineation in Figure 4. Overall, a greater degree
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of updating from prior to posterior parameter distributions was observed in the micro
delineation. In particular, we observed a greater change of the distribution shapes

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from the uniform prior to the posterior for DSIS, nIS, DSTree and nTree in the micro
delineation compared to the macro one, indicating that observations of flow data
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better constrained the likely values of these parameters at the micro delineation. Since
the same likelihood measure and posterior sampling approach conditioned on same
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sets of runoff observations were applied consistently to calculate the posterior
parameters for CSO 027 at micro and macro scales, we argue that the difference
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between estimated posterior parameters from the micro and macro scale models is due
primarily to the modeling scale. The posterior distribution for KWidth and nConduit
showed slight differences between the micro and macro delineation, indicating that
the scale change did not have considerable impact on these two parameters. This may
be because the original properties of the pipes were retained on both scales without
spatial aggregation and the subcatchment width was dependent on the corresponding
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subcatchment area that was measured based on the GIS map. In addition, DSLawn and
nLawn at both scales showed little update from the prior distribution.
The first-order sensitivity analysis suggested that: 1) at both micro and macro
scales, DSIS was the most important parameter, followed by nIS in determining the
total flow (Figure 5). Relatively speaking, DSIS and nIS were more important in
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determining the total flow at micro scale than at macro scale; 2) the peak flow showed
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greatest sensitivity to nConduit followed by DSIS at both scales; 3) the total flow showed
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very little first-order sensitivity (Ix < 4%) to DSTree and nTree at both scales, while
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DSTree and nTree each accounted for a significant percentage (Ix > 9%) of the total
variation in the peak flow in the micro model. However, the peak flow of the macro
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model showed less response to these two parameters; and 4) the peak flow and total
flow at both scales exhibited little sensitivity to DSLawn or nLawn, suggesting that the
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variability in these lawn parameters had almost no effect on the variability in total and
peak flow predictions. For the micro-scale model, the sum of IX of all parameters was
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0.92 for the total flow and 0.88 for the peak flow. For the macro-scale model, the sum
of IX was 0.82 for the total flow and 0.89 for the peak flow. The IX value of 0.82 for
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the total flow suggested that approximately 18% of the variability in the total flow
data was left unexplained by considering the first-order effects of the model input
parameters. With techniques described in Ratto et al. (2001), we also examined the
interaction structures among SWMM parameters conditioned on the observed total
flow and peak flow for the micro and macro scale. The results (not shown here) did
not show a significant level of interaction between any parameters. Overall, the
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parameter sensitivity results were consistent with the findings shown in Figure 4,
where the posterior distribution of the parameters with higher first-order sensitivity
values was greatly updated from the prior distributions.
3.2 Flow Uncertainty for CSO 027

Three sets of flow uncertainty bounds, at a significance level α = 90% against
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observations for 6 representative events of different magnitudes, for CSO 027 were
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estimated from the prior parameters (labeled “Prior”), and the posterior parameters for
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the macro-scale (labeled “Macro”), and the micro-scale delineation (labeled “Micro”)
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(Figure 6). The “Micro” and “Macro” flow uncertainty bounds were substantially
refined compared to the “Prior” uncertainty bounds (Figure 6A-E), indicating that the
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combined peak flow and total flow were informative in reducing model output
uncertainty at both scales. Comparing the “Micro” and “Macro” uncertainty bounds,
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the “Micro” bounds were better constrained towards the observations while the wider
“Macro” bounds indicated a greater uncertainty. The discretization level, however,

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did not show any noticeable influence on the timing of peak flow occurrence. The
results suggested that, given the same observed data, the macro-scale model was less
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informative in updating the “Prior” bounds to the posterior uncertainty bounds than
the macro-scale model. The only exception is shown in Figure 6F, in which both
“Micro” and “Macro” flow bounds fail to envelope the observations of the small rain
event (< 1.94 mm/hour), implying that the SWMM model has limitations in
simulating small rain events.
19

J. Hydrol. Eng.
3.3 Model Validation for CSO 044
For validation purposes, the posterior distributions of the parameters calibrated
based upon the micro- and macro-scale CSO 027 were first applied to the micro- and
macro-scale CSO 044 to generate the flow rates, respectively (i.e., same-scale
validation). Figure 7 shows the flow uncertainty bounds at α = 90%. Overall, the
t
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simulation uncertainty bounds estimated from the posterior parameters of the macro
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CSO 027 delineation (labeled “Macro”) were wider than those computed from the
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posterior parameters of the micro CSO 027 delineation. The results indicated that the
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employment of the posterior parameters calibrated from the macro-scale model led to
acceptable simulation results with the observations falling within the uncertainty
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bounds. However, the posterior parameters derived from the micro-scale model
reduced the simulation uncertainty to a greater degree on a catchment of the same

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modeling scale. We then applied the posterior parameters derived from the micro- and
macro-scale CSO 027 on the macro- and micro-scale CSO 044 (i.e., cross-scale
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validation). We found that all uncertainty bounds generated from the posterior
parameters calibrated based upon the macro-scale CSO 027 led to a much greater
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degree of uncertainty represented by wider flow bounds, while the flow uncertainty
bounds estimated from the posterior parameters of the micro CSO 027 narrowed
down the uncertainties of flow predictions at the macro-scale CSO 044 (Figure 8). In
order to determine why the posterior parameters derived from the micro-scale CSO
027 outperformed the ones from the macro-scale CSO 027, we computed the 25% and
75% credible interval and the mode value (as an alternative to the optimal parameter
20

J. Hydrol. Eng.
value) for each posterior parameter distribution derived from micro and macro CSO
027 (Table 6). It indicated that the credible interval of DSIS and nTree generated from
micro-scale CSO 027 was much smaller than those from macro-scale CSO 027. As
shown in the sensitivity analysis (Figure 5), DSIS showed greatest influence on the
simulated peak flow rates. In this case, it may be the wider range of DSIS value
t
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derived from the macro CSO 027 that contributed largely to the greater uncertainty in
d cr
flow predictions. Hence we argue that the calibrated parameters obtained based upon
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the macro delineation might not be adequate to be applied to simulate another
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sewershed delineated at a different scale, while the posterior parameters derived from
the micro delineation might be able to accommodate the variation as a result of

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different catchment aggregation level to a much better degree and thus provide more
reliable predictions.
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4. Conclusions
In this study, we examined how the level of catchment discretization influenced

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SWMM modeling uncertainty in the context of urbanized sewersheds. Based on our
findings we concluded that the manner in which continuous geographic spaces were
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disaggregated into discrete spatial units had a significant impact on both the model
parameterization and simulation results. The results showed that the parameter values
were quite sensitive to the modeling scales. Furthermore, both model calibration and
validation results showed that the posterior parameter sets calibrated based upon the
micro delineation reduced the uncertainty of flow predictions to a greater degree
compared to those from the macro delineation. Accordingly, we argue that the
21

J. Hydrol. Eng.
calibrated parameter sets given the macro-scale delineation may be sufficient to
provide acceptable simulations for this specific site at the matching scale. However, it
might not be considered reliable to be used for simulating another site unique in its
characteristics (e.g., surface cover, spatial configuration, etc.). As the model

framework at micro scale takes care of spatial connectivity between the homogeneous
t
ip
subcatchments via flow routing component, the posterior parameter distributions
d cr
derived from the micro delineation might better accommodate the variation in
te s
catchment characteristics, and provide higher confidence level in terms of parameter
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transferability for modeling other sites. These findings are important for future
development of hydrological models. Hydrological modeling, especially the small-

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scale modeling has always been hindered by availability of runoff measurements, in
which case model parameters cannot be calibrated for better model fit or validated to
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test its acceptance. In this instance, we recommend using the posterior parameter
distributions calibrated based upon a micro-scale model of a gaged site to model other
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ungaged sites delineated on the same fine scale, although such parameters derived
from small-scale model may lose physical significance at larger scales. Furthermore,
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the micro-scale model can easily incorporate changes in surface covers at a small
scale. This is significant for assessment of the potential runoff control benefits given
small-scale landscape modification or on-site green infrastructure (GI)
implementation, e.g., planting more trees and replacing impervious roofs with green
roofs. Since onsite GI control measures are commonly implemented in a
disaggregated and distributed network, a micro-scale model is needed to capture the
22

J. Hydrol. Eng.
net utility of decentralized GI facilities at the parcel scale while the lumped models
are inadequate to simulate such decentralized GI measures.
Acknowledgements
We gratefully acknowledge the National Science Foundation Award BSC-

0948952 for an Urban Long Term Research Area Exploratory project (ULTRA-EX)
t
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that supported and inspired this research. We also want to thank the Onondaga County
d cr
Water and Environment Program and CH2MHILL, Syracuse for the provision of
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monitored flow data.
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Figure 1
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Figure 2
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Figure 3
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Figure 4
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Figure 5
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Figure 6
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Figure 7
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Figure 8
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Table 1. The principal measured SWMM parameters
Object Measured Parameters Sources

Area, precentage of imperviousness, GIS layers including the
Subcatch-
slope, curve number of different land use sewer network map, soil map,
ment
type DEM, and orthoimagery
Length, shape, maximum depth of the

Conduit
conduit's cross section Syracuse city sewer system
evaluation survey
Junction Invert elevation
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Table 2. Summary of surface characteristics in the studied sewersheds
Percentage of Land Cover

Total Area
Site Slope
(hectare) Impervious
Tree Lawn
Surface
CSO27 46.76 1.36% 68.4% 18.0% 13.6%

CSO44 17.75 0.97% 52.2% 21.3% 26.5%
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Table 3. Input datasets used for SWMM parameterization
Data Description Source
The U.S. Geological Survey

Digital Elevation The DEM published in 2008 is at a 10-m resolution,
(USGS)
Model (DEM) and was used to derive the 10-m slope raster file.
(http://www.usgs.gov/)
The Natural Resources

The data set consists of the georeferenced 30-m soil
Conservation Service (NRCS)
map developed based on the surveys conducted
Soil Survey Geographic
NRCS Soil Map during 2004 – 2010. We used it to generate the
(SSURGO) Database
hydrologic soil group (HSG) map, which were then
(http://soils.usda.gov/survey/ge
used to compute the curve numbers.
ography/ssurgo/)
The orthoimagery taken in 2009 is a 1-m resolution
NYS GIS Clearinghouse
remotely-sensed digital picture in a raster data
Orthoimagery (http://www.nysgis.state.ny.us/
format, bases on which the sewershed land cover
gateway/mg/)
classification was created.
The Sewer The map includes georeferenced sewerlines, Onondaga County consultants,
Network Map junctions and sewershed outlets in a vector format. CH2M Hill, Syracuse
A SUNY ESF meteorological

station (LAT. 39°2'50'' LONG.
The data set includes five minute interval rainfall
76°9'23'') installed at and
Meteorological data, daily maximum and minimum air
maintained by the Museum of
Data temperatures, and monthly evaporation rate for
Science and Technology
August – October, 2009.
(MoST*) at Armory Square,
Syracuse
The data set contains the monitored 15-min interval
combined sanitary-storm flows during August 13th –
Monitored Flow Onondaga County consultants,
September 10th, and 5-min interval combined
Data CH2M Hill, Syracuse
sanitary-storm flows spanning the period from
September 10th – October 29th, 2009.
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Table 4. Characteristics of rainfall events
Lag Time Date Total Ave.

Event Duration
Magnitude from Last (Year Depth intensity Purpose*
no. (hours)
Rain (hours) 2009) (mm) (mm/hr)
1 9.6 10/5 1.08 1 0.92 C
Light 2 87.4 9/22 0.67 1.3 1.94 C&V

3 8.4 10/1 0.67 1.3 1.94 C
4 26.6 11/6 0.42 1 2.38 C
5 40.1 11/5 0.75 2 2.67 C
6 57.5 8/21 0.58 1.78 2.71 V
7 73.1 9/26 2.75 8.89 3.23 V
Meduim 8 17.6 9/29 1.17 4.3 3.68 C
9 11.9 10/6 1.67 9.14 5.47 V
10 9.9 10/24 1.42 9.4 6.62 C&V
11 5.0 10/7 0.83 6.4 7.71 C&V
12 81.5 10/28 3.33 27.69 8.32 C&V
13 200.9 8/18 0.25 5.1 20.40 C
Heavy 14 15.3 8/29 1.08 24.6 22.78 C&V
15 35.0 9/23 0.25 8.1 32.40 C
* C = Calibration, V= Validation
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Table 5. The prior distribution of studied SWMM inferred parameters
Inferred Parameters Description Prior Distributoin Typical values from literature
Manning's n for overland

0.01~0.015 (Huber et al.,
nIS flow over impervious Uniform (0, 0.2)
1988)
surfaces
Manning's
n 0.02~0.8 for pervious surfaces
nTree Manning's n for trees Uniform (0, 1)
(Huber et al., 1988; Huber
and Dickinson, 1992)
nLawn Manning's n for lawn Uniform (0, 0.5)
Depth of depression 0.012~0.1 (Huber et al., 1988;
DSIS storage of impervious Uniform (0, 0.5) Huber and Dickinson, 1992;
surfaces Tsihrintzis and Hamid, 1998)
Depression
Storage Depth of depression 0.1~0.2 for pervious surfaces
DSTree Uniform (0, 0.8)
(inch) storage of trees (Huber et al., 1988; Huber
Depth of depression and Dickinson, 1992;
DSLawn Uniform (0, 0.5) Tsihrintzis and Hamid, 1998)
storage of lawns
Fraction of the square
0.2~0.5 (MWH Soft Inc.,
KWidth root of subcatchment Uniform (0, 1)
2005)
width
0.011~0.017 (Huber et al.,
Manning's roughness
nConduit Uniform (0, 0.1) 1988; Huber and Dickinson,
coefficient for conduits
1992)
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Table 6. The 25% and 75% credible interval and the mode value of the posterior parameter distribution
Micro CSO 027 Macro CSO 027

Calibrated
Parameter
Mode 25% CI 75% CI Mode 25% CI 75% CI
DSIS 0.134 0.117 0.156 0.084 0.036 0.293

nIS 0.048 0.042 0.073 0.094 0.078 0.124

DSTree 0.451 0.403 0.525 0.224 0.202 0.479
nTree 0.491 0.431 0.564 0.370 0.278 0.619
DSLawn 0.251 0.146 0.279 0.188 0.168 0.349
nLawn 0.226 0.188 0.329 0.314 0.181 0.327
KWidth 0.698 0.447 0.708 0.452 0.392 0.744
nConduit 0.020 0.016 0.032 0.019 0.025 0.040
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Impact of SWMM Catchment Discretization

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Impact of SWMM Catchment Discretization

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Journal of Hydrologic Engineering.

Submitted March 28, 2012; accepted December 21, 2012;

Impact of SWMM Catchment Discretization: A Case Study in Syracuse, NY

Ning Sun a, Myrna Hall b, Bongghi Hong c, LianJun Zhang d

13210-2778, Email: mhhall@esf.edu.

Rice, Ithaca, NY, 14850, Email: bh43@cornell.edu.

Drive, Syracuse, NY 13210-2778, Email: lizhang@esf.edu.

Myrna Hall, Email: mhhall@esf.edu.

SWMM, Discretization, Parameterization, GLUE, Uncertainty, Calibration,

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

model parameterization and output uncertainty of the Storm Water Management

Model (SWMM) 5.0. We developed two catchment delineations for a highly

urbanized sewershed in Syracuse, NY: 1) the macro-scale model containing a

Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation (GLUE) methodology. Then we applied calibrated

posterior parameter sets at micro and macro scales individually to a second

posterior parameters calibrated based on the micro delineation resulted in a higher

degree of reduction in output uncertainties for both calibrated and validated

micro delineation could provide a higher confidence level in terms of parameter

transferability for modeling other, particularly ungaged sites.

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

1.1 Combined Sewer Overflows

areas accompanied by more frequent occurrences of sewer overflow events in cities

quality (Grigg, 1996). A major challenge of urban stormwater management is to

developed based on the measurements of historical storm events. Flow records,

hydrologic models cannot be calibrated or validated without flow measurements,

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

however, which indicates significantly overlooked uncertainty associated with applied

model parameters and flow predictions.

1.2 Issues with Model Scales

catchment discretization methods, a “fine” versus “coarse” discretization, for the

complexity of flow paths mathematically at a coarse scale. Because physical

hydrological processes are characterized by strong nonlinearity, Moore and Gallant

variable parameters to represent the mean hydrologic response related to catchment

characteristics. Beven (1989) suggested that future development in physically based

processes. An alternative to the lumped-parameter model is the distributed-parameter

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

of subwatersheds used to divide the watershed. Discretization of Hubbard Brook

employed the ‘complex method’ in multi-objective optimization to estimate four

stormwater model with a constrained optimization technique can be applied to large

(2009) demonstrated that successive catchment discretization in the Storm Water

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

Hellweger (2012) investigated the effects of spatial resolution on SWMM model

predictions in an urban catchment using the Artificial Network Generator (ANGel).

uncertainty issues into consideration. Uncertainties or errors associated with model

particularly for nonlinear hydrologic models. Recent research that demonstrated

applications of the GLUE procedure in rainfall-runoff models can be found in Beven

dependence of the control parameters? 3) Do the parameters calibrated from finer

catchment delineation in one catchment lead to better model performance in another

catchment? To answer these questions, we developed two catchment delineations with

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

estimates of sewer hydrographs, particularly for ungaged sites.

2.1 SWMM Parameterization

subcatchment (Huber et al., 1988). Here a subcatchment is defined as an area of land

to an outlet point, which could be either a storm drain or another subcatchment

where V is the volume of water on the subcatchment, dt is the computational time

subcatchment outflow, derived as follows:

where W denotes the subcatchment width, k is a conversion constant equal to 1.486

is the surface depression storage, and S is the subcatchment slope.

Copyright 2012 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

The input parameters of physical process-based models such as SWMM often

correspond to the interpretable physical properties of the site. As geographic

processing and model parameterization, the majority of the SWMM control

and, hereafter will be referred to as inferred parameters. Previous studies either

developed empirical relationships from which these parameters could be inferred