SHARING EXPERIENCES OF URBAN RESILIENCE WITHIN CHINA

In August 2018 the Centre for Water Systems (CWS), University of Exeter; and the School of Environment (SOE), Tsinghua University, organised the ESSPRIT (Embedding Spongy Strategic Planning In flood Resilient cities) Capacity Building Workshop in Suzhou, China. This workshop was part of the ESPRIT project, funded by the UK Royal Academy of Engineering and is being led by Dr Albert Chen at CWS and Prof Haifeng Jia at SOE. The ESPRIT project aims to tackle the challenges present in Urban Flood Management and Resilience through joint research between the UK and China, which reflects the challenges we see globally and are seeking to address within the RESCCUE project. The other CWS RESCCUE members Dr Barry Evans and Dr Mike Gibson also participated in the dissemination event.

The ESSPRIT workshop was attended by over 100 delegates, including directors and officers of the Department of Housing and Urban-rural Development of Jiangsu Province, Suzhou Municipal Bureau of Housing and Urban-rural Development, Urban Planning Bureau, Water Bureau, Garden Management Bureau, China Academy of Urban Planning and Design, Beijing Municipal Institute of City Planning and Design, Shanghai Municipal Engineering Design Institute, and practitioners from local consulting companies participated in the workshop. It received significant attention form the media in Suzhou and nearby areas where the local Suzhou TV channel interviewed the experts and broadcasted the news regarding the workshop.

Within the scope of the RESCCUE project, Dr Barry Evans presented the overview of the RESCCUE project discussing interdependencies, analysing cascading effects and the use. The focus of Dr Evans’ talk was on the importance of engaging with stakeholders to get a comprehensive understanding of the intricacies and complexities of determining cascading effects and how the use of the HAZUR® tool facilitates this engagement and analysis of impacts as a result of cascading failures.