# What neighborhoods have the worst drainage systems for rainfall?

InsightsCategory: Public SafetyWhat neighborhoods have the worst drainage systems for rainfall?
Chesiree Katter asked 2 years ago

San Diego is a desert, and rainfall is uncommon. Often times I find myself driving through massive puddles or see water flowing down the street. Which communities are good to avoid when the storms hit?

eric Staff replied 2 years ago

The most likely way to answer this question is probably the map of storm drains, from SANGIS: http://www.sangis.org/

eric Staff answered 2 years ago

SANGIS publishes a geographic file of the locations of "drain structures", which appear to be the entrances to storm drains. There are a lot of these; here is a map of all of them in san diego, colored by the community the drain is in:

A raw count of drains will depend on the size of the community, so here are the san diego communities that are larger than 2 sq kilometers, ranked from the smallest number of drains per sq km.

name                            DRAIN      area    count_per_area
----------------------------  -------  --------  ----------------
TIJUANA RIVER VALLEY               22  14.6227            1.50451
SAN PASQUAL                        72  43.1926            1.66695
MILITARY FACILITIES               262  92.1037            2.84462
LOS PENASQUITOS CANYON             52   4.94249          10.521
PACIFIC HIGHLANDS RANCH           140  10.7745           12.9936
MISSION BAY PARK                  383  17.4868           21.9022
DEL MAR MESA                      214   8.50495          25.1618
TIERRASANTA                       929  29.5284           31.4613
NCFUA SUBAREA II                  137   3.45853          39.6122
RESERVE                           150   3.31251          45.2829
SERRA MESA                        453   9.00942          50.2807
BLACK MOUNTAIN RANCH             1065  20.7387           51.3532
OTAY MESA-NESTOR                 1129  21.8699           51.6236
FAIRBANKS RANCH COUNTRY CLUB      170   3.2103           52.9545
NAVAJO                           1995  37.0283           53.8777