Water Sensitive Urban Design Objectives for Darwin Harbour

To facilitate the implementation of the WSUD principles a series of performance targets define the specific outcomes that a development is to meet. For Darwin these objectives were identified at by a workshop involving industry experts and local planners, researchers and practitioners. The interim design objectives are summarised below.

WSUD Objective Performance Measure/Target
Potable Water Conservation No quantitative potable water conservation objective has been specified, however a 20% water conservation target is considered technically feasible and is suggested as an interim target
Stormwater Quality Stormwater discharged from development areas to be treated in accordance with best practice:
  • 80% reduction in the mean annual load of Total Suspended Solids (TSS)
  • 60% reduction in the mean annual load of Total Phosphorus (TP)
  • 45% reduction in the mean annual load of Total Nitrogen (TN)
  • 90% reduction in the mean annual load of Gross Pollutants
Waterway Stability It is recommended that a waterway stability objective is not adopted at this stage. Further technical investigation is required to refine and test the practicality and achievability of the objective