Recognizing the importance of the Oak Ridges Moraine in keeping Ontario’s groundwater system functioning properly, and seeing the moraine as a common feature stretching for some 160 km across the landscape, the Regional Municipalities of York, Peel and Durham, along with the City of Toronto, combined forces in the late 1990s to set a path forward to better understand and manage groundwater resources. A series of public consultation sessions were focused on a document prepared by the three regional governments entitled “The Oak Ridges Moraine – Proposals for the protection and management of a unique landscape.” One result of this work was an agreement to coordinate the management of groundwater resources. A program manager was retained in summer of 2001 to launch the program.

Upon designing and populating a program database, the program then set out to make use of the data to begin regional interpretations. Building upon work undertaken through the 1990s by the Geological Survey of Canada, between 2002 and 2006, the program undertook two significant regional numerical modelling studies that saw the establishment of a consistent geological framework, and groundwater flow system understanding that could be used by partner agencies to improve decision-making.
A key addition to the program was the 2015 introduction of a custodianship program for numerical models. Municipalities and conservation authorities, with financial support from the province through the source water protection program, commissioned expensive and technically challenging numerical models to assist them in addressing legislative requirements. With little in-house modelling expertise, these models were in danger of being lost to the public sector. The ORMGP retained a numerical modelling expert to help oversee the transfer and storage of nearly 100 numerical models within the ORMGP. Going forward, these can now be considered ‘living models’ and can be improved and re-used to gain further insights into groundwater behaviour.

Over the years the program has grown, and now supports a dynamic interactive website that allows for partner agencies (both government and consulting companies) to search for, analyse, and/or download data and/or interpretations from the program. The value of information stored within the program is conservatively estimated to be over $1 billion.

Some unique strengths of the program include:

• A focus on data and data management: This is often a program component that is overlooked, underfunded and underappreciated. The ORMGP database was designed to efficiently hold geological data as well as any temporal water-related data collected at any location, either in the subsurface or at ground surface. A regular task is to ensure reliability in the program database by seeking out and correcting erroneous data. This takes considerable time, money, dedication and passion. The first two have been made available by the funding partners, whereas the latter two have flourished under the oversight and contributions from all partner agencies.
• A focus on the long term: Program staff often mention a 100-year time horizon. What information, stories, data and/or knowledge would technical practitioners starting their careers, in the future want or need to know? The program is driven by long-term goals rather than short-term agendas, allowing for thorough data collection, validation, and innovative analysis and interpretation.
• A holistic approach to water management: Hydrogeologists focus on how and where water moves in the subsurface. However, to fully understand groundwater flow system dynamics, numerical modelling and water budgets are frequently used approaches. These require that hydrogeologists pay attention to climate data (how much water is available to enter the groundwater flow system and where is this occurring?) and equally to streamflow data (how much water is leaving the groundwater flow system, and where is this occurring?). The ORMGP has taken a holistic approach to understanding groundwater flow.
• An ongoing QA/QC process: The ORMGP relies on the use of program data for quality assurance and quality control. Rather than waiting many years to ensure the database is error-free, ORMGP adopts a flexible approach, allowing partners to use data shortly after it is imported or entered. Through data usage, such as graphing and mapping, errors often present themselves and are immediately corrected.
• Presentation of data and interpretations: The program focuses on providing partnered technical staff with both raw data and interpretations. Staff with considerable technical modeling and hydrogeological skills enable the program to offer synthesized interpretations, enhancing the value of the data.
• Communication across agencies: The ORMGP provides a forum for staff from different organizations to learn what they are each doing and how they interact with the ORMGP. This cross fertilization of ideas drives innovation and learning for all staff involved in the program.