Program B: Water Sensitive Urbanism

Nigel TAPPER (Monash University)Darryl LOW CHOY (Griffith University)

“This program focuses on the influence of urban and peri-urban configurations on resource flows across a range of landscape scales. It is applying green infrastructure and climate responsive design principles to water security, flood protection and the ecological health of terrestrial and aquatic landscapes from neighbourhood to whole-of-catchment level. The program aims to establish integrative socio-technical urban and regional planning and design processes that will deliver practical tools to improve resilience of Australian urban environments and their regional settings”.

Key issues: • Ecological values/Ecosystem services• Planning /Design• Socio-ecological landscapes

Combining state-of-the-art science of climate change modeling, surface and sub-surface hydrology, streamwater ecology and chemistry, and urban climatology with the best new thinking on urban and regional planning, design and practice

Program B: Water Sensitive Urbanism

Society Water Sensitive Urbanism

Future Technologies

AdoptionPathways

B2 Planning, Design and Management to Protect

and Restore Receiving Waters

B3 Water Sensitive Urban Design and Urban Micro-climate

B1 Catchment-scale Landscape Planning for Water Sensitive Cities in an age of Climate Change

B4 Building Socio-technical Flood

Resilience in Cities and Towns

B5 Statutory Planning for Water Sensitive Urban Design

B1 – Catchment-scale Landscape Planning for Water Sensitive Cities

with Climate Change

B1.1 Urban Rainfall in a Changing Climate

(Cities as Water Supply Catchments)

Bhupendra Raut1, Lorenzo de la Fuente1,

Michael Reeder1, Christian Jakob1 and Alan Seed2

1School of Mathematical Sciences, Monash University2Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research, BOM

Project B1.1: Urban rainfall in a changing climate

This project is:• Providing rainfall projections

at appropriate space/time scales to support planning and design decisions

• Providing quantitative estimates of the uncertainties in rainfall projections.

Key outputs: • Rainfall regimes determined

for cities at 5km2 scales for use by other Programs/projects.

Regional model uncertainty Unpredictable scales

Climate scenario uncertaintyGlobal model uncertainty

• Refine and complete regime analysis for the dynamical model simulations

• Refine the statistical model

• Test the entire downscaling chain (GCM, Dynamical Model, Statistical Model) for current climate

• Test leaving the regional model out of the chain

• Extend the model to future climates and CMIP5

Immediate Plans

• The project is developing urban-scale projections of the future rainfall over the selected Australian cities with estimates of the uncertainty in these projections using a combination of dynamical downscaling and regime-dependent stochastic downscaling

• The approach quantifies how well the different observed synoptic patterns are simulated in the regional climate model, and whether the model correctly predicts the fraction of rainfall attributable to each class of weather pattern

• The statistical properties of each of the rainfall regimes can be determined from radar and rain gauges, and used to construct a multifractal cascade model of the rainfall distribution and its evolution

Summary

B1.2 Catchment-scale landscape planning for water sensitive city-regions in an age of

climate change

Silvia Serrao-Neumann1, Darryl Low Choy1

and Steve Kenway2

(still recruiting)

1Urban Research Program, School of Environment, Griffith University2Advanced Water Management Centre, School of Chemical Engineering, University of Queensland

This project will: • Derive a first order urban metabolism evaluation

framework for the city region across urban, peri-urban and rural landscapes.

• Encapsulate this framework within a whole-of-landscape planning and management city-region model that links cities ecologically and hydrologically to their region whilst accommodating the assessment of urban growth adapted to climate change.

• Ground this inquiry in statutory and non-statutory regional (catchment) scale planning processes.

Project B1.2: Catchment-scale Landscape Planning for Water Sensitive City-regions in an age of Climate Change

Key outputs: • Scenarios of plausible futures for rapidly growing

metropolitan regions that adopt a whole of landscape regional scale outlook that links cities ecologically and hydrologically to their regions.

Urban Centre

Dominant Urban Forces

Strong Non-Urban Sector

The Metropolitan Region

Rural Landscapes Rural Landscapes

The Peri-urban Landscapes

Landscape Scale

(Human use and occupation)

Biophysical environment

Socio-ecological systems

Socio-economic environment

“…an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the actions and interactions of natural and/or human factors” (Selman, 2006: 6)

Zone of Resilience Interests

?

(Kenway, 2012)

Peri-urban Demands

Urban Demands

Environmental Demands

Rural Demands

Cultural Demands

Outdoor Recreation Values

Cultural Heritage Values

Scenic Amenity Values

Rural Production Values

Biodiversity Values

Indigenous Values

Ecosystem Services

Habitation Values

Regional Landscape ValuesDemands on the Regional Landscape

Water: a lin

king element in th

e

Landscape fo

r “joined-up”

planning

Future Population in a changing Climate

“n” y

rsTowards a Conceptual Model for a Resilient

“Water Sensitive” Metropolitan Region

Modified Mass Balance & Urban

Metabolism Model

Precipitation

PresentPopulation

Quantity

Quality Floo

ding

Ope

n Sp

ace

syst

em

evapotranspiration

Total Water in the metropolitan regional

systemGroundwaterRecycled

waterStored waterSurface water

Ecos

yste

m S

ervi

ces

Carbon Energy

Water

Adapted Mass Balance & Urban

Region Metabolism Model

?

Roles of Water in the Metropolitan Region

Water functions as a:

• Element in the landscape contributing to landcsape values (aesthetical, recreational, tourism, cultural, ecological, hydrological and natural resources)

• Process and agent of change

• Commodity and product

• Conductor and transporter of goods, materials and energy (and other flows)

What is the managerial connection between these roles?

Statutory Vs Non StatutoryStatutory

Planning RegimeNon Statutory

Planning Regime)

Regional & Local Planning Mandates

Voluntary Requirements (GI)

Statutory Requirements (GI)

Avenues to Incorporate Science into Planning

Mandatory Optional

Alternative Metabolic Futures

(urban form, density, GI investment, climate)

Thank You