STORMWATER TREATMENT WETLAND

At 93 acres, Meadow Lake in Flushing Meadows/Corona Park, Queens, is New York City’s largest fresh waterbody.

With project funding from the NYC Department of Environmental Protection, eDesign Dynamics designed a stormwater wetland to treat runoff from a parking lot adjacent to the Lake. The design includes the routing of runoff from the parking lot into a forebay via a series of inflow swales. The forebay allows for the collection of debris and serves as a critical hydraulic control mechanism. The runoff preferentially flows from the forebay into the wetland via a wetland inlet. When the wetland is at capacity, the wetland inlet is bypassed and runoff flows from the micro-graded forebay, through an overflow weir into an overflow swale. eDesign Dynamics designed the preferential system to maximize treatment time of the “first flush” off the parking lot. The wetland is planted with a diverse native plant palette that is designed to improve water quality, provide habitat for fauna, and create a point of interest for park users.