News and Events

Dec 2005

Marrickville Project Wins Award
Dr Rebekah Brown and Jean Brennan from the National Urban Water Governance Program have been involved with the ‘RiverLife Sustainable Water Environments’ project with Marrickville Council since its inception in early 2002. This project is a research partnership between Marrickville Council (led by Jan Orton, Manager of Environmental Services) and Monash University. It aims to address some of the barriers to sustainable water management, alleviate stress on the Cooks River, and use urban stormwater as a source of water for irrigation and other purposes.

Nell Graham (right) and Councillor Fiona Byrne of Marrickville Council accepting the NSW Local Government Excellence in Environment Award for Stormwater Management

In December 2005, Stage 2 of this research project was awarded the NSW Local Government Excellence in Environment Award for Stormwater Management (Division C, 2004-05). The project involved trialling a ‘bottom-up’ local community planning process at the neighbourhood level for sustainable water management. It has allowed researchers to gain insight into alternative planning approaches often advocated in theory but rarely put into practice. It focuses on in-depth involvement of the community for the identification of local water issues and the design of solutions.

The Illawarra Road sub-catchment in Marrickville South has been used as a trial area for the project. A range of people have been involved from many disciplines and stakeholder perspectives in identifying solutions to water management problems in this area, resulting in innovative solutions, such as techniques and technologies for harvesting, filtering and storing stormwater.

More information is available at: http://www.marrickville.nsw.gov.au

Nov 2005

Capacity Building Tool Wins SIA (Victoria) Research Award
André Taylor recently accepted the Stormwater Industry Association's 2005 Research and Development award for innovation on behalf of a small team of researchers from Monash University and CSIRO. The award was for a research project that produced 'triple bottom-line assessment guidelines' for stormwater projects (available at http://www.catchment.crc.org.au).

The trial of these guidelines highlighted how they can create an information-rich, deliberative environment for stakeholders to assess options. Tools such as these can help to build a shared vision of what alternatives are desired, resolve conflict, build human resources, as well as strengthen relationships within and between stakeholder groups (i.e. help to build 'institutional capacity').

SIA Victoria Stormwater Innovation Award – Research and Development 2005

Institutional Capacity Chapter in New ARQ Guidelines
In late 2004, Dr Rebekah Brown, Dr Mike Mouritz and André Taylor were asked by the Editor in Chief of Engineers Australia’s Australian Runoff Quality (ARQ) Guidelines to write a chapter on institutional capacity. The resulting chapter was included in the finalised guidelines that were launched in Sydney on 28 November 2005. The chapter provides a background to institutional capacity, a framework that can be used to assess institutional capacity in a given region or organisation, and resources that can be used to build capacity in weak areas. A PDF copy of the chapter is available from the publications section of this web site.

André and Mike helped to explain the content of the new chapter to workshop participants at the launch of the ARQ guidelines. It was pleasing to see a high recognition of the need for this chapter in ARQ, which is predominantly a technical guideline on modern approaches to urban water management.

Dr Mike Mouritz (WA Dept for Planning and Development) delivering part of the ARQ workshop

June 2005

Winner of a Victorian Our Water Our Future Postgraduate Scholarship
Dr Rebekah Brown and Professor Chris Cocklin (Monash University) have been awarded with one of five Victorian Our Water Our Future Scholarships. The scholarship was awarded for research into improving urban water governance in support of sustainable water management.

Recipients of the Victorian Our Water Our Future Scholarships for 2005.

Click here for the press release from the Victorian Minister for Water.

July 2005

Research Funding Success
Dr Rebekah Brown was part of a team of researchers that was successful in the 2005 round of the Victorian Science, Technology & Innovation grants program. The successful project is entitled Facility for Advancing water Biofiltration (FAB), which aims to develop improved solutions for the on-site treatment and management of stormwater.

Including in-kind support, the total funding for this successful proposal is more than $4.26 million, sourced from Government and industry partners. Rebekah will be Team Leader for Program 2: Institutional and Social Issues.

Click here or more general information on the Facility for Advancing water Biofiltration (FAB) project, or download this summary (PDF 32KB) for more information on the institutional aspects of the research.

Aug 2005

Researchers Attend 10th International Urban Drainage Conference
Dr Rebekah Brown and André Taylor presented papers at the 10th International Drainage Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.

This conference is held every three years and is regarded as the premier urban water drainage conference in the world.

Two of Rebekah’s papers were delivered during a keynote session on institutional implements to advancing more sustainable forms of urban water management.

Copies of these papers are available in the ‘Papers & Publications’ section of this web site.

All the presenters at a keynote session on institutional issues at Copenhagen.
From left to right: Dr Peter Stahre (Malmo Water & Wastewater Works, Sweden), Dr Rebekah Brown (Monash University), Prof. Richard Ashley (Pennine Water Group, UK), Dr Liz Sharp (Pennine Water Group, UK) and Dr Govert Geldof (Tauw, Netherlands).
NB: The kilt is an advertisement for the next international drainage conference in Scotland.

Aug 2005

Linkages Being Strengthened with Researchers in NZ
In August 2005, Dr Rebekah Brown was invited to participate in a National Taskforce for Low Impact Development (LID) in New Zealand. A strong relationship already exists between Monash University and leaders in the promotion of LID in NZ (e.g. Landcare Research and the Auckland Regional Council) through the university’s work on technical aspects of water management. Rebekah’s work is helping to broaden the scope of this relationship to include institutional and governance dimensions.

A proposal to emerge from this visit was to host an international workshop on ‘Urban Water Governance’ at the upcoming 7th International Conference on Urban Drainage Modelling and the 4th International Conference on Water Sensitive Urban Design which will be held on 3-7 April 2006 in Melbourne. For more information on this conference, click here .

Sep 2005

Program Staff Run First Workshop in Perth
Staff from the National Urban Water Governance Research Program were asked to work with approximately 25 local stakeholders to scope and deliver a full-day workshop on 9 September 2005 titled ‘Identifying Critical Capacity Building Actions to Overcome Barriers to the Implementation of More Sustainable Forms of Urban Water Management in Perth’.

The primary aims of this workshop were:

1. To undertake a ‘rapid appraisal’ of implementation challenges (i.e. capacity building needs / gaps) in the Perth region with respect to promoting more sustainable forms of urban water management (e.g. water sensitive urban design).
2. To identify high priority actions / projects that are needed in Perth to overcome key implementation challenges.

The workshop provided local water managers in Perth with some preliminary information on critical gaps in the local capacity building and necessary actions (e.g. projects) that are likely to be of a high priority, so work can begin on these actions while the 2.5 year National Urban Water Governance Research Program does its work. It also provided program staff with a useful introduction to key institutional capacity building issues facing the Perth region and to begin to develop relationships with many influential stakeholders.

Alison Atkins (the program’s ‘industry liaison officer’ in Perth) and Victoria Kent of the Water Corporation are thanked for their help in planning and implementing this workshop.

Some of the feedback from the workshop attendees in Perth.

Sep 2005

Industry Liaison Officers for Brisbane, Perth and Melbourne
To assist with research activities in the three geographic centres of research, funding organisations in Perth, Brisbane and Melbourne have nominated an ‘industry liaison officer’. These people are:

• Alison Luobikis
  Strategy Analyst, Water Cycle Project, Water Corporation, Perth,
  e-mail: alison.atkins@watercorporation.com.au
  ph. (08) 9420 3704.
• Chris Lee, Manager
  Smart Water Fund, South East Water, Melbourne,
  e-mail: chis.lee@sewl.com.au
  ph. (03) 9552 3497.
• Gavin Blakey
  Principal Officer Water Resources, Brisbane City Council,
  e-mail: gavin.blakey@brisbane.qld.gov.au
  ph. (07) 3403 6639.