From our home to yours: WSC stories

The CRCWSC has never let ‘business as usual’ thinking get in the way of its mission to create resilient, liveable, productive and sustainable cities and towns.

In the current COVID19 environment, we’re thinking about ways to share stories and experiences, deliver our research findings, spread adoption of WSC principles and practices, and promote on-ground projects. It’s still important to us to help build industry capacity and keep our participants and partners up to date.

Just last week, members of our IRP4 team (Water sensitive outcomes for infill developments) presented at a webinar for the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment. Professor Geoffrey London (University of Western Australia) and Professor Nigel Bertram (Monash University) overviewed the recently released Infill typologies catalogue – Revision A, explaining the range of housing typologies, at densities and configurations relevant to Australian cities and applicable to different contemporary infill development scenarios. Then, Dr Steven Kenway explained how the team evaluated the water sensitive performance of different typologies, using a performance evaluation framework.

Around 130 people attended the webinar, and could ask questions via a chat function. This also stimulated some discussion between participants, giving people the opportunity to engage and connect with each other. The webinar was recorded, so participants can go back and listen to the presentations and read through the Q&A in their own time. And practitioners can count their attendance towards their continuing professional development (CPD) requirements.

We’re also planning a variety of online engagement activities with our researchers and participants: Couch time—conversations with the CRCWSC. These sessions will highlight some of our recent reports and publications, and answer some common questions on topics like valuing water sensitive investments, and ways to passively irrigate our cities and towns. We also hope to share stories of on-ground activities around the country.

You can watch our first episode about passively irrigated landscapes below. And stay tuned for more information about our Couch time sessions in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, let us know any topics or questions you’d like us to cover. Send your ideas to Lorena Ikic at Lorena.Ikic@crcwsc.org.au . We welcome your feedback, ideas and insights.