Climate change will increase risks of urban flooding due to increasingly heavy rainfall, which overwhelms outdated drainage. Retrofitting sustainable urban drainage (SUDS) to existing urban areas, making use of the public realm to overcome a shortage of space on individual sites offers a solution. However, there is little experience of this approach, which requires new types of cooperation between municipalities and owners to overcome physical, regulatory and cultural barriers. The project will demonstrate reduced flooding while protecting or improving amenities, biodiversity, health and wellbeing, local economies and saving public money. The adoption of these approaches will increase adaptation capacity to the effects of heavy rainfall and deliver added benefits for society.
Plymouth City Council has secured €4.6m in grant, to be shared amongst the 13 project partners from UK, France, Belgium and the Netherlands. The funds are from the European Regional Development Fund, obtained through the Interreg 2Seas Programme.
In Plymouth WRC supports the integration of sustainable drainage into plans for the renewal of the open spaces and pedestrian areas in the city centre, making use water to help bring these spaces to life. Find out more on our Better Places Plymouth page.