A long time ago there was no storm water management needed for the simple reason that in the event of heavy rains the water had sufficient space to flow towards the ponds and the sea. Look at the Great Salt Pond which was large compared to what is now. The smaller it gets the more chance it will flood. Storm water management is nothing more then to avoid flooding and pollution by taking measures such as adequate infrastructure (canals, roads with sufficient drains, catchment for water like cisterns). Some islands like Statia use separate artificial ponds to catch part of the huge amount of water during a tropical wave or a hurricane. If we had looked ahead then we could have made cisterns under each building mandatory to catch part of the run of water and at the same time save a lot of water. The uncontrolled construction has taken the space of the natural path of the run off water which has now increased the risk of flooding. The paving of the yards is an additional impact on the flow of the water. Due to these risks a study was done by Unesco under guidance of Damir Brjdanovic. Here you can read part of the study with a movie where you can see the flood prone areas. This study was shown at our Enviroweek event in 2007 but all residents should be aware of this study to see if government is considering this study in their zoning and other policies.

This is an example where VROM could implement the condition in the permit to catch the run off to avoid further damage to the ocean.

"Flooding has become a growing and serious problem for Island Territory of St Maarten causing an ongoing threat to its residents, homes, businesses and public infrastructure. With the frequent presence of hurricanes, tropical storms, increase in frequency of high-intensity storms due to climate change, inability of the existing storm water system to cope with larger rainfall events and dynamics of the new development activities the situation is likely to become even more disastrous if the appropriate actions are not taken immediately. As a response to such threats, the government of the Island Territory of St Maarten has initiated a storm water modeling study as a first step towards the development of a comprehensive storm water management plan. This study, recently completed by UNESCO-IHE (info Z. Vojinovic), aimed to provide an overview on the extent of flooding problems, and as such it was meant to be used for strategic planning purposes. It is also intended to lead towards a more detailed feasibility investigation and engineering design work. It is important to note that due to the lack of reliable rainfall and topographical data this study has a degree of uncertainty. From the overall analysis of model results, it can be summarized that the main cause of flooding is either due to inadequate channel capacities (in areas where storm water channels exist) or simply due to the non-existence of any drainage structures. In those areas where no drainage infrastructure exists, most of the storm water runoff is confined to the roads and the terrain sloping downwards would lead water to the lower parts wherever they are (very often the water finds its way between the buildings). During the heavy rainfall events, it can be expected that the resulting street flow would generate considerable depths and velocities and as such it would constitute significant risk to the surrounding properties and people. Furthermore, in case of tropical storms, or hurricanes, a rise in sea level could create major devastation to those areas that are close to Philipsburg beach and the two ponds (Fresh pond and Great Salt pond). From the overall analysis of channel capacities, areas where the most significant problems can arise at present are the low-lying areas in Cul De Sac catchment (particularly along the LB Scot Road and Coralita Rd/Zagersgut). In this catchment, parts of the main channel network which are particularly important for the conveyance of the storm water runoff, are having very limited capacity and as such they are not able to convey any storm larger than storms with an average occurrence of once in every 5 or 10 years (or in other words, storms having rainfall intensities of 50 to 60 mm/hr). Such channel capacities represent a major threat to the nearby properties and residents living in this area. As a result, the degree of risk placed on properties and residents due to the insufficient channel capacities is considerably high. This can be illustrated by the magnitude of impacts of the storm that occurred on 30th July 2005. For this storm the reported rainfall intensity was found to be in the order of 150 to 200 mm/hr (which is significantly higher than the capacity of the existing channel network). Furthermore, the inlet to the Fresh Pond (and also to the Great Salt Pond) was found to be a bottleneck in releasing large flows during the heavy rainfall events. As a result, extensive ponding and flooding can be expected to occur in the low-lying areas of this catchment even for low or insignificant rainfall events. These areas obviously need urgent attention and top priority.

Solving the flood-related problems on St Maarten requires the full use and proper integration of available structural and non-structural measures. Neither the structural nor the non-structural approach can solve all the problems by itself. Both types of measures should be considered and integrated into the solutions to attain to an appropriate damage reduction." (source Unesco-IHE Institute for water education)