1. Art and Diseño

Introduction Introduction
Our guidebook on urban ecosystem services opened
a new era in the history of our series entitled Sustainable Development Applications. It was our first
thematic publication dedicated entirely to the extremely relevant issues of nature in the city. Given
the importance of this topic we decided to continue
with it in the fourth and now fifth guidebook which
you are now holding in your hands (or reading on
your computer screen). This time our focus is on
water in the city. Water and greenery are very strictly
interrelated: urban greenery may not be efficiently
managed independently of water just as it is impossible to effectively solve the qualitative and quantitative problems of water management without taking
green infrastructure into account. This interrelationship is well illustrated by examples of ecological
engineering or ecohydrology: two concepts that we
often refer to in our publications as these effectively
combine ecological and engineering knowledge to
increase the effectiveness and efficiency of natural
system management.
While the two previous publications dealt with
urban greenery, the current guidebook is dedicated
to water in the city. The opening chapter of this
publication is entitled “Water as the backbone of
quality of life in the cities of the future” and presents the challenges of urban water management in
the context of the global challenges of sustainable
development and the actions undertaken in this
field by international organizations. Subsequent
chapters show the practical issues associated with
urban water management at the strategic, planning,
health, financial and technical levels; all of these
topics are eventually summarized in the chapter
on integrated urban management. As before, the
last chapter of this guidebook presents a collection of good practices, in this case related to urban
stormwater management.
The figure below illustrates the interrelationships
between the chapters of the last three guidebooks of
the series entitled Sustainable Development Applications (3–5), showing how the problems discussed in
this guidebook are closely related to those in our
6 | Sustainable Development Applications no 5, 2014 previous publications. Aiming to show the practical relationships between the discussed issues, this
time we decided to additionally illustrate most of
these with concise case studies at the end of each
chapter. In many cases urban water-related issues
are placed in the broader context of managing the
urban natural system or even more broadly, the
socio-ecological system of the city.
Over the last two years, the Sendzimir Foundation has given a great deal of consideration to
water in the city. This included local projects carried
out as part of the Foundation’s Summer Academy
“Challenges of sustainable development” series (in
the years 2013 and 2014) and Autumn Academy
“Challenges of Sustainable Water Management” in
2013. These were organized within the framework
of a project entitled “Challenges of Sustainable
Water Management. Ecosystem services in an era
of climate change” which received funding from
the National Fund for Environmental Protection
and Water Management and the patronage of the
Minister of the Environment. Participants tried to
solve the problems of water management in the
cities of Torun, Poznan and Krakow in cooperation with municipal authorities and other stakeholders. The reports prepared by the participants
of these Academies provide many practical tips and
are available for downloading from the Sendzimir
Foundation’s webpage.
The last of these reports concerning sustainable
stormwater management in Krakow (where the example of a community housing estate at Magnolia
St. was used) was especially revealing and convinced
us of the need to carry out large demonstrative projects of this type in Poland. Projects where such
solutions were implemented on a large scale in housing estates in other countries include Augustenborg (MalmÖ, Sweden) and Kronsberg (Hannover,
Germany). These undertakings are described in the
good practices section at the end of this guidebook
to serve as inspiration. Similar implementations in
Poland could easily be classified as priority projects
of urban revitalization where European Union funds
could be used. Urban investments could also benefit
from other solutions such as green public procurement. Demonstrative projects of this type could
become the seedlings of broader sustainable urban
stormwater management programmes, such as in
Augustenborg and Kronsberg.
On a smaller scale, the Sendzimir Foundation
has contributed to the promotion of the practical
implementation of this type of solution by building
small showcase rain gardens in Lodz and offering brochures with information on rain gardens
adjusted to the Polish climatic conditions and indigenous plant species. Rain gardens are particularly strongly popularized in Australian cities, e.g.
Melbourne which we featured in one of the good
practices of the previous guidebook (SDA4).
Last but not least, residents themselves have
pointed to the interrelationships between urban
water and greenery through an internet application
at <www.licznazielen.pl> developed for the major
Polish cities of Krakow, Lodz, Poznan and Warsaw
as part of the “Licz na zieleń” project (Polish for
“Count on greenery”). In the implementation of this
project, the Sendzimir Foundation has benefited
Urban ecosystem services (SDA3)
from the best experience in Participatory Geographic Information Systems and so-called geosurveys, solutions presented in the previous guidebook
published in this series. These are now being applied
by the Sendzimir Foundation in collaboration with
the authorities of the abovementioned cities to support nature management in Polish cities. A review of
the maps with survey results shows that when asked
to indicate places where they like to spend time
among greenery (or other valuable green spaces),
residents of the abovementioned cities commonly
point to those related with water.
Whether planning the further development of
Polish cities, applying for financing for revitalization
projects from European Union funds or implementing the guidelines of the Polish National Urban
Policy, nature-related issues should receive more
attention. This was our consideration when preparing this and previous guidebooks published in this
series. Now we may only wish that the readers find
the contents inspiring and useful to improve the
quality of life in cities.
Tomasz Bergier, Jakub Kronenberg, Iwona Wagner
WATER AND THE URBAN NATURE SYSTEM
Water as the backbone of quality of life in the cities of the future (SDA5)
How to assess the value of nature? Valuation of street trees in the Lodz city centre (SDA3)
Urban water ecosystem services (SDA3)
Blue aspects of green infrastructure (SDA4)
URBAN WATER MANAGEMENT
Barriers to preserving urban trees and ways of overcoming them (SDA3)
Water in the urban space and integrated urban management (SDA5)
Tools for strategic planning and management of urban water (SDA5)
SPATIAL PLANNING,
URBAN PLANNING
PUBLIC PARTICIPATION
The role of urban planning
and architecture in water
management (SDA5)
Public participation in
decision making on urban
nature (SDA3)
How to safely retain
rainwater in the city:
technical tools (SDA5)
The financial mechanisms of
urban stormwater management
(SDA5)
Water in the urban space and
the health of residents (SDA5)
Geographic information
systems in participatory
management of nature in the
city (SDA4)
Structural soils and other
ways of facilitating tree
growth in the difficult habitat
conditions of cities (SDA4)
Unconventional forms of
interdisciplinary collaboration
in shaping urban greenery:
the example of London (SDA4)
The planning and principles
of tree protection in
the investment process (SDA4)
Innovative ways of supporting
the establishment of green
infrastructure in cities:
collaboration of local authorities
with investors and property
owners (SDA4)
The local spatial management
plan as a tool for nature
management in the city
(SDA4)
Replacement tree planting
in cities: key problems
related to administrative
decisions (SDA4)
Balancing inner city development
and biodiversity protection on
urban wastelands – the Central
Railway Area of Munich (SDA4)
TECHNICAL INSTRUMENTS
FINANCING
Tree protection at
the construction site (SDA4)
The protection of urban trees
and the perceived
safety hazard (SDA4)
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