Recovering from a natural disaster is one of society’s biggest challenges that often involves a protracted process of myriad government, private enterprise and individuals working together to form a recovery plan.
In the case of Lismore in northern New South Wales that was struck by devastating floods in February 2022, it has also involved academia.
The Living Lab Northern Rivers is a partnership between Southern Cross University, Northern Rivers Reconstruction Corporation, and the University of Technology Sydney, with the purpose of combining research and community feedback to create beneficial solutions to help build resilience for the future.
Encompassing everyone in the community from farmers to mechanics to musicians, along with academia and government support, the aim of the Living Lab is to “combine lived experience with rigorous research across a wide range of disciplines”.
“The idea is that the universities can play a unique role in bringing the very, very best expertise, whether it is in public health, whether it is in river ecology, whether it is in design and planning to bear on the questions of how best to rebuild and how best to help these communities to recover,” Professor Elizabeth Mossop, Dean of the UTS School of Design, Architecture, and Building, told the Urban Greening audience.
“Also, the universities are not the government and I think that gives them a different kind of opportunity to engage with communities to provide disinterested and trusted advice in what is a very confusing and contested space.
“There have been a lot of disasters in Lismore and the government is slow to mobilise.
Lismore has seen very significant disasters before but not on this scale. The local government, I think it’s fair to say, have been completely overwhelmed and confused about how to proceed and the state government is not well placed to help because state government, as you are well aware, is very siloed.”
Mossop’s point is illustrated by the fact that the NSW Department of Planning and Environment, on 25 February 2022, rejected a $100,000 grant application by Lismore City Council to improve its flood warning system.
Three days later Lismore was hit by the biggest flood in modern Australia history inundating the region. The effects of the disaster are still being felt more than one year later.
“Over the past year, the Northern Rivers Reconstruction Corporation have done their best to get organised, they have hired lots of people, they have set up a new organisation, they have developed programs, they have taken advice, particularly from Queensland, and they are moving forward with a series of programs,” Mossop said.
“But it doesn’t mean that a lot of the displaced people are in new houses, or that there are very clear solutions, even now as to how to move forward. And we have been trying to work out how we can most effectively provide better advice to the Reconstruction Corporation, and to the communities, about how to move forward in this and so, we’ve developed a range of different areas of work.
“One of the things that we learnt post Katrina [the huricane that devastated New Orleans, where Mossop was involved in reconstruction work], is that the more informed people are about the technical issues that are affecting them, the better they are able to make decisions about what to do what to do about their houses, but also what to do about their towns or what to do about their communities.”
Lismore has an interesting configuration of rivers and creeks such as Wilson River and Leycester Creek, which join at Lismore. When the water rises at either Wilson River and/or Leycester Creek, it can result in major flooding in Lismore.
“We know that there is a lot for the people of Lismore to understand,” Mossop said. “So, one of the things we’re doing is engaging with this public discourse through exhibitions. We have a shopfront in downtown Lismore.
There are a number of 3D models because that’s what people understand and that’s how people can locate their own place within these catchments
“We’re actually just putting up our second exhibition, but the first exhibition that we displayed was called look ahead, and it had some information about the flood that had taken place in Lismore. It had a series of case study projects, describing strategies and solutions for other places in the world suffering from similar kinds of flood disasters.
“There’s a timeline of Lismore’s recorded flood history, so it’s talking both about severity of floods, but also about flood intervals. There are a number of 3D models because that’s what people understand and that’s how people can locate their own place within these catchments.”
The purpose of the exhibitions is to show people effective strategies to address the problems that they have in Lismore with the case studies asking questions such as, “can farmlands survive? Or can we re-design rivers to minimise flood damage to town centres?”
The shopfronts have achieved their aim of engaging the community in order to foster further discussion.
UTS has also established three studios to explore issues around housing, house elevation and “what other forms of denser forms of housing might be appropriate in downtown Lismore along with practical case studies.
“We’ve also got a second studio, which is working in Wardell, a very small town, lower down in the catchment, looking at how you can build resilience through the development of various different kinds of community facilities,” Mossop said.
“We are also examining what sorts of facilities you can make as resilience hubs, or evacuation centres and how you can put different uses together to try to help these very small communities be more resilient.
“The third studio is really investigating how you might look at these kinds of landscape-based strategies and apply those in downtown Lismore to try to make that more resilient.
“Now, none of these studios are coming up with the answers but they are canvassing ideas, and they are allowing a conversation with the residents of Lismore. We are also partnering with local experts from Southern Cross University across the subjects of coastal ecology and engineering in catchment management to really get this dialogue going.
“We are also working with the local experts to get them to be thinking about their own expertise, but also in relation to how we might think about reconstruction, and rebuilding.”
Mossop points out that the NSW Reconstruction Corporation is rolling out a resilient homes and lands strategy with the key being to communicate with the public clearly on what this strategies mean and how they will be implemented.
The power of the community existing community network networks in Lismore were what led to this incredible citizen rescue operation
“I actually do think a lot of people in Lismore really did feel abandoned,” Mossop said.
“The power of the community existing community network networks in Lismore were what led to this incredible citizen rescue operation. It does mean that the Reconstruction Authority and the authorities generally have a lot of work to do to come back from that and that’s what they are trying to lay the groundwork for.
“It is going to take time and the jury is very much out about whether this recovery operation is going to be effective or not. You know, and I think people are deeply sceptical about it, unsurprisingly, as they probably should be but have high hopes, and I really hope that the Living Lab can serve as the means to allow a bit more joined up thinking about what adaptation means and about how this area really can build back better.”
The people of Lismore will be hoping for any kind of strategy that can save them from anymore devastating floods.