Definitions. As used in this chapter, the following terms shall have
the meanings indicated:
AGRICULTURAL FACILITY
A structure associated with beekeeping; commercial feedlots;
dairying and egg production; floriculture; fish or fur farming; grazing
and livestock raising; poultry raising; raising of grain, grass, mint
and seed crops; orchards and raising of fruits, nuts, berries and
vegetables; sod farming; placing land in federal programs in return
for payments in kind; and owning land, at least 35 acres of which
is enrolled in a conservation reserve program under United States
Code title 16, chapter 58.
AVERAGE ANNUAL RAINFALL
A calendar year of precipitation, excluding snow, which is
considered typical as determined by the rainfall record for the Madison
area between March 12 and December 2, 1981.
BEST MANAGEMENT PRACTICE
Structural or nonstructural measures, practices, techniques
or devices used to avoid or minimize soil, sediment or pollutants
carried in runoff to waters of the state.
BUSINESS DAY
A day the offices of the City are routinely and customarily
open for business.
CONNECTED IMPERVIOUSNESS
An impervious surface directly connected to a separate storm
sewer or water of the state via an impervious flow path.
CONSTRUCTION SITE
An area upon which one or more land-disturbing construction
activities occur, including areas that are part of a larger common
plan of development or sale where multiple separate and distinct land-disturbing
construction activities may be taking place at different times on
different schedules but under one plan.
CONTAMINANT OF CONCERN
A hazardous substance that is present at a site or facility
in such concentrations that the contaminant poses an actual or potential
threat to human health, safety or welfare or the environment based
upon: a) The toxicological characteristics of the hazardous substance
that influence its ability to adversely affect human health or the
environment relative to the concentration of the hazardous substance
at the site or facility; b) the chemical and physical characteristics
of the hazardous substance which govern its tendency to persist in
the environment and the chemical, physical and biological characteristics
at the site or facility which govern the tendency for the hazardous
substance to persist at the site or facility; c) the chemical and
physical characteristics of the hazardous substance which govern its
tendency to move into and through environmental media; d) the naturally
occurring background concentrations of the hazardous substance; e)
the thoroughness of the testing for the hazardous substance at the
site or facility; f) the frequency that the hazardous substance has
been detected at the site or facility; and g) degradation byproducts
of the hazardous substance.
DESIGN STORM
A hypothetical discrete rainstorm characterized by a specific
duration, temporal distribution, rainfall intensity, return frequency
and total depth of rainfall.
DEVELOPMENT
An artificial change to improved or unimproved land.
EFFECTIVE INFILTRATION AREA
The area of the infiltration system that is used to infiltrate
runoff and does not include the area used for site access, berms or
pretreatment.
EROSION
The process by which the surface of the land is worn away
by the action of wind, water, ice or gravity.
EROSION AND SEDIMENT CONTROL PLAN
A comprehensive plan developed to address pollution caused
by erosion and sedimentation of soil particles or rock fragments during
construction.
FINAL STABILIZATION
All land-disturbing construction activities at the construction
site have been completed and that a uniform, perennial, vegetative
cover has been established, with a density of at least 70% of the
cover, for the unpaved areas and areas not covered by permanent structures,
or employment of equivalent permanent stabilization measures.
FINANCIAL GUARANTEE
A performance bond, maintenance bond, surety bond, irrevocable
letter of credit or similar guarantee.
IMPERVIOUS SURFACE
An area that releases as runoff all or a large portion of
the precipitation that falls on it, except for frozen soil. Rooftops,
sidewalks, driveways, parking lots and streets are examples of areas
that typically are impervious.
IN-FILL DEVELOPMENT
An area of land located within existing development that
has no impervious surface.
INFILTRATION
The entry of precipitation or runoff into or through the
soil.
INFILTRATION SYSTEM
A device or practice such as a basin, trench, rain garden
or swale designed specifically to encourage infiltration, but does
not include natural infiltration in an area that releases as runoff
a small portion of the precipitation that falls on it such as lawns,
gardens, parks, forests or other similar vegetated areas, redirection
of rooftop downspouts onto lawns or minimal infiltration from practices,
such as swales or roadside channels, designed for conveyance and pollutant
removal only.
KARST FEATURE
An area or surficial geologic feature subject to bedrock
dissolution so that it is likely to provide a conduit to groundwater,
and includes caves, enlarged fractures, mine features, exposed bedrock
surfaces, sinkholes, springs, seeps or swallets.
LAND-DISTURBING CONSTRUCTION ACTIVITY
Any man-made alteration of the land surface resulting in
a change in the topography or existing vegetative or nonvegetative
soil cover that may result in runoff and lead to an increase in soil
erosion and movement of sediment into waters of the state. Land-disturbing
construction activities include clearing and grubbing, demolition,
excavating, pit trench dewatering, filling and grading activities.
MAINTENANCE AGREEMENT
A legal document that provides for long-term maintenance
of stormwater management practices.
MAXIMUM EXTENT PRACTICABLE
A level of implementing best management practices to achieve
the performance standards specified in this chapter which takes into
account the best available technology, cost effectiveness and other
competing issues such as human safety and welfare, endangered and
threatened resources, historic properties and geographic features.
Maximum extent practicable allows flexibility in the way to meet the
performance standards and may vary based on the performance standards
and site conditions.
NEW DEVELOPMENT
Any development resulting from the conversion of previously
undeveloped land or agricultural land uses.
NONPOINT SOURCE POLLUTION
Pollution from many diffuse sources including rainfall, snowmelt
or irrigation water that picks up and carries away natural and human-made
pollutants and deposits such in the waters of the state.
OFF-SITE
Located outside the site as designated in the permit application.
ON-SITE
Located within the site as designated in the permit application.
ORDINARY HIGH WATER MARK
The point on the stream bank or shore up to which the presence
and action of surface water is so continuous as to leave a distinctive
mark such as by erosion, destruction or prevention of terrestrial
vegetation, predominance of aquatic vegetation, or other easily recognized
characteristic. Where the stream bank or shore at any particular place
is of such character that it is difficult or impossible to determine
where the point of ordinary high-water mark is, recourse may be had
to the opposite stream bank of a stream or to other places on the
shore of a lake or flowage to determine whether a given stage of water
is above or below the ordinary high-water mark.
PERCENT FINES
The percentage of a given sample of soil, which passes through
a # 200 sieve.
PERFORMANCE STANDARD
A narrative or measurable number specifying the minimum acceptable
outcome for a facility or practice.
PERMIT
A written authorization made by the Zoning Administrator
to the applicant to conduct land-disturbing construction activity
or to discharge post-construction runoff to waters of the state.
POLLUTANT
Any dredged spoil, solid waste, incinerator residue, sewage,
garbage, refuse, oil, sewage sludge, munitions, chemical wastes, biological
materials, radioactive substances, heat, wrecked or discarded equipment,
rocks, sand, cellar dirt and industrial, municipal and agricultural
waste discharged into water.
POLLUTION
Contaminating or rendering unclean or impure the waters of
the state, or making the same injurious to public health, harmful
for commercial or recreational use, or deleterious to fish, bird,
animal or plant life.
POST-CONSTRUCTION
Completion of land-disturbing construction activity and final
site stabilization of a construction site.
PRE-DEVELOPMENT
The land cover types present before the initiation of land-disturbing
construction activity, assuming that all land uses before development
activity are managed in an environmentally sound manner.
REDEVELOPMENT
Areas where development is replacing older development.
RESPONSIBLE PARTY
Any person holding fee title to the property or other person
contracted or obligated by other agreement to meet the requirements
of this chapter.
RUNOFF
Stormwater or precipitation including rain, snow, ice melt
or similar water that moves on the land surface via sheet or channelized
flow.
SEDIMENT
Settleable solid material that is transported by runoff,
suspended within runoff or deposited by runoff away from its original
location.
SEPARATE STORM SEWER
A conveyance or system of conveyances including roads with
drainage systems, streets, catch basins, curbs, gutters, ditches,
constructed channels or storm drains, which meets all of the following
criteria: a) is designed or used for collecting water or conveying
runoff; b) is not part of a combined sewer system conveying both sanitary
sewage and stormwater runoff; c) is not draining to a stormwater treatment
device or system; and d) discharges directly or indirectly to waters
of the state.
SITE
The entire area included in the legal description of the
land on which the land-disturbing construction activity occurs or
occurred.
STOP-WORK ORDER
An order issued by the Zoning Administrator which requires
that all construction activity on the site be stopped.
STORMWATER MANAGEMENT PLAN
A comprehensive plan designed to reduce the discharge of
runoff and pollutants from stormwater after the site has undergone
final stabilization following completion of the construction activity.
STORMWATER MANAGEMENT SYSTEM PLAN
A comprehensive plan designed to reduce the discharge of
runoff and pollutants from hydrologic units on a regional or municipal
scale.
STREAM BANK
The land surface abutting the bed of any navigable waterway
which, either before any project or alteration of land contours or
as a result of the proposed project or alteration, slopes or drains
without complete interruption into the waterway.
TECHNICAL STANDARD
A document that specifies design, predicted performance and
operation and maintenance specifications for a material, device or
method.
TOP OF THE CHANNEL
An edge, or point on the landscape, landward from the ordinary
high water mark, where the slope of the land begins to be less than
12% continually for at least 50 feet. If the slope of the land is
12% or less continually for the initial 50 feet landward from the
ordinary high water mark, the top of the channel is the ordinary high
water mark.
TR-55
The United States Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources
Conservation Service, and Urban Hydrology for Small Watersheds, second
edition, Technical Release 55, June 1986.
TYPE II DISTRIBUTION
A rainfall type curve as established in the United States
Department of Agriculture, Soil Conservation Service, Technical Paper
149, published 1973.
WATERS OF THE STATE
Those portions of Lake Michigan and Lake Superior within
the boundaries of this state, and all lakes, bays, rivers, streams,
springs, ponds, wells, impounding reservoirs, marshes, watercourses,
drainage systems and other surface water or groundwater, natural or
artificial, public or private, within this state or its jurisdiction.
WETLANDS
An area, whether natural, mitigated or restored, where water
is at, near or above the land surface long enough to be capable of
supporting aquatic or hydrophilic vegetation and which has soils indicative
of wet conditions.
WETLANDS IN AREAS OF SPECIAL NATURAL RESOURCE INTEREST
Those wetlands both within the boundary of designated areas
of special natural resource interest and those wetlands which are
in proximity to or have a direct hydrologic connection to such designated
areas. Areas of special natural resource interest include: a) cold
water communities including all trout streams and their tributaries
and trout lakes; b) Lakes Michigan and Superior and the Mississippi
River; c) state and federal designated wild and scenic rivers, designated
state riverways and state designated scenic urban waterways; d) unique
and significant wetlands identified in special area management plans,
special wetland inventory studies, advanced delineation and identification
studies and areas designated by the United States environmental protection
agency; e) calcareous fens; f) habitat used by state or federally
designated threatened or endangered species; g) state parks, forests,
trails and recreation areas; h) state and federal fish and wildlife
refuges and fish and wildlife management areas; i) state and federally
designated wilderness areas; j) designated or dedicated state natural
areas; k) wild rice waters; and l) any other surface waters identified
as outstanding or exceptional resource waters.