Abstract: To investigate the hydrological effect of typical permeable pavement, an artificial simulated rainfall experiment system is designed and developed in this work. After verification of rainfall characteristics, two experiments are conducted for the pavements of permeable concrete and grass-planting brick－a constant rainfall intensity infiltration experiment and a rainfall runoff experiment under design storm scenarios. The results show the experimental system can realize automatic, continuous variations in rainfall intensity. The simulated rainfall is close to the design rainstorm in terms of rainfall peak, rainfall total, and rainfall process, with a satisfactory effect. In comparison with the grass-planting brick, permeable concrete has a higher initial infiltration rate but a lower stable infiltration rate, and enters the stable infiltration stage earlier. Grass-planting brick can control runoff to a certain degree, even under sufficient water supply conditions. The Horton model gives a good description of the infiltration characteristics of permeable pavements. Permeable concrete shows a high correlation between runoff-producing processes and rainfall processes; it produces runoff earlier than the grass-planting brick for the same return period, with higher runoff production. Grass-planting brick performs better in reducing total runoff and peak runoff and delaying peak runoff.

Key words: hydrological effect, physical experiment, permeable pavement, artificially simulated rainfall, low impact development