keefer wrote:Jad,
New parking lots have all the lighting and planters and that is required. I spoke at length with a customer of mine who also worked for Southland Paving before retirement and he told me that most of the mini islands with tress serve multiple purposes. Most importantly is water diversion and direction. Modern parking lots are more than meets the eye when it comes to engineering. He told me that even if a group were to buy say 20 acres of land for the sole purpose of building an autocross lot, they'd have a really hard time getting approval of just a flat lot with no plan that addresses water flow.
Jad and Chris: I spent a fair number of years on grading jobs... including the parking lots at Petco Park, Legoland, etc. Chris is correct, water flow management during a rain storm is required. However, typical flow requirement can be as simple as a 2% fall (angle) for water to flow toward a "collection area". (Think about the old swale-and-box-inlet system at thd old Q parking lots.) The collection area then directs the water to "discharge" points (usually underground storm drain piping). Another example is the mild "crowning" of wide roadways where the center of the road is higher than the edges. The water travels to the edges of the road and into swales, drainage ditches, or inlet boxes during a storm.
So, yes, a large plot of A/C could be designed that could be "relatively" flat (2% fall isn't much) and contain both a series of perimeter swales and box inlets. If you "crowned" the entire site with a 2% fall, and put collection swales and drains on the outside/perimeter... you're good to go.
Dan Chambers"It's
just a "well prepared" street car ... or a very, very well-mannered track car."
1983 SC #91 3.6L, "Black Pearl" Livery
1987 944 (gone but not forgotten)