A conceptual lumped ecohydrological streamflow model (EHSMu) is presented as a promising tool to simulate runoff in urban catchments. The model, based on the interaction between a soil bucket and two linear reservoirs, enables also evapotranspiration and aquifer recharge to be estimated. Notwithstanding its minimalism, EHSMu describes interactions among soil moisture dynamics, hydrological fluxes and ecological processes. The model was calibrated and validated within two densely urbanized sub-basins in Charlotte (US). A Monte Carlo procedure is used to investigate the efficiency of random sets of 8 model parameters. Results show the high model performance (NSE = 0.72). The influence of land use change is evaluated, by varying the imperviousness and crop coefficients. Synthetic experiments show that increasing urbanization triggers a linear decrease in evapotranspiration and aquifer recharge, while it increases the fast runoff. An opposite response is achieved by installing vegetation with higher potential evapotranspiration, which would contribute to the actual evapotranspiration making up 50–55% of the total water balance.

提出了概念性集总生态水文流量模型（EHSMu），作为模拟城市集水区径流的有前途的工具。该模型基于土壤桶和两个线性储层之间的相互作用，还可以估算蒸散量和含水层补给量。尽管极简，EHSMu还是描述了土壤水分动力学，水文通量和生态过程之间的相互作用。该模型已在美国夏洛特的两个密集城市化子盆地中进行了校准和验证。使用蒙特卡洛程序研究8个模型参数的随机集合的效率。结果显示出较高的模型性能（NSE = 0.72）。通过改变不透水性和作物系数来评估土地利用变化的影响。综合实验表明，城市化程度的提高触发了蒸散量和含水层补给量的线性下降，同时又增加了快速径流。通过安装具有较高潜在蒸散量的植被可以实现相反的响应，这将有助于实际的蒸散量，占总水分平衡的50-55％。