Community engagement

Engaging with the community builds trust and ownership, leads to better decision making, and can deliver more effective outcomes. Local community knowledge and support is highly valuable in developing local and regional-scale solutions, and can provide a rich source of ideas for water sensitive strategies and solutions. Sustainable, resilient, productive and liveable communities are well within reach if communities are actively engaged.

Transformation of 1.6km of existing concrete channel in a heavily urbanised catchment into a natural waterway. The project proactively engaged the local community to create a treasured environment.

A collaborative approach with the local community resulted in a series of works to the urban waterway, including daylighting of a piped section of the creek.

In the Park Orchards and Ringwood North Community Sewerage Area, a trial area of 100 properties in the Park Orchards area has been selected to test and understand the potential to maximise the use of on-property treatment and local reuse of treated wastewater for irrigation.

Naturalisation of a local creek produced demonstrated ecological and amenity benefits that led to an increase nearby property prices.

The low-lying suburb of Elwood in inner Melbourne has had ongoing flooding issues for a long time. A proactive engagement was delivered to partner with communities and develop a shared understanding of the challenges and co-design possible solutions.

Wanyarram Dhelk—which means Good Waterhole in Djaara language—aims to improve the water health of the Bendigo Creek and its tributaries.

This project involved diverting water from a council drain into the grounds of Marrickville West Primary School, filtering it and then harvesting it to create a green space for the school and the local community.