Surfacing urban wetlands in two urban renewal sites in Sydney

Image credit: Ilaria Vanni

Project summary:

Urban wetlands in Australia provide benefits for climate change mitigation, pollution reduction, habitat provision and socioecological connection. However, in large cities like Sydney, urban wetlands are unseen because undergrounded, and, therefore not adequately understood. This illegibility, and loss of understanding by residents, planners and policy makers impedes wetlands' good management. This project surfaces wetlands through visualisation in a multimodal knowledge platform focusing on two urban renewal sites, Green Square and Marrickville South. We leverage design ethnography to develop resources for strengthening multiple stakeholders’ socioecological engagement through methods empowering just, creative and open participation.

Chief investigators: Associate Professor Alexandra Crosby; Associate Professor Ilaria Vanni Accarigi; Dr Sarah Jones; Associate Professor Donna Houston; Professor James Goodman; Professor Juan Salazar

Funding organisation: Australian Research Council

PhD Scholarship available

Project: Political Ecologies of Water
Supervised by James Goodman, Ilaria Vanni and Donna Houston (Macquarie)
Available to Domestic students only

You will be skilled in ethnographic research and will pursue an independent research project to better understand how communities living in Sydney’s renewing urban spaces can engage with local ecological contexts and complex histories of change. The project will focus on waterways, waterscapes or wetlands.

Please read UTS Graduate Research School website for application details. 
Contact: james.goodman@uts.edu.au & Ilaria.vanni@uts.edu.au