The Role of Groundwater Vulnerability in Urban Development Planning

Abstract

Groundwater resources in most places of Iran are considered to be one of the important drinking water supplies for civilians. In city of Tehran, 25% of drinking water is being supplied from groundwater. This fact would enforce the requirement to protect and conserve groundwater resources in the city for its further development plan. Municipality of Tehran, District-22 has been designed for the latest and the ultimate development boundary of the city, which is being constructed in the north-west part of the city. The groundwater resources of the District are considered as main drinking water supplier for its future short term population. Hence due to the importance of groundwater of the District, the vulnerability to nitrate contaminant is being examined by means of Drastic Model. The results obtained, indicate that due to regional environmental characteristics, vulnerability index varies in different parts of studied area. so the eastern and south eastern parts of the District have experienced the highest vulnerability. Besides comparing the results with nitrate concentration reveals that correlation has been approximately 61% and among the drastic layers, precipitation layer has been determined as the most effective parameters for final drastic index layer of studied area. In this regard, concerning the vulnerability map, urban land application, including residential and commercial in mentioned parts should be prohibited.