River ecology and building developments ... what do you think?

[waterdragon]

Hi,

I'm new to this site, and wanted to get some opinions from people about rivers and building developments.

I'm doing some research looking at the kinds of developments that get built close to rivers, and what kinds of things get taken into account by the planners, developers, etc - environmental and ecological concerns, for instance? (I imagine that concerns for the local environment or ecosystems often comes a poor second to economics, but maybe I'm wrong!)

Does anyone have experience of this? Perhaps something through work or personally? My work is in the UK, but I would be interested to hear about experiences in other countries too.

Thanks for any thoughts people want to share!

[CaptainPanic]

Safety comes first... especially in places where flooding is a risk.

Because flooding is a real risk that can completely destroy the buildings, people now realize that nature is a very good buffer to absorb water and slowly release it. The Netherlands is actively re-constructing nature (ok, I know that sounds stupid) to give the rivers more space.

 

The Dutch are demolishing houses close to the rivers, and moving the dikes / levees away from the river to give it more space in case of high water.

[waterdragon]

That's interesting, thanks. So is the environment around the river being left to develop naturally, so is it being sculpted into a 'socially acceptable' version of nature? Does it become land that is inviting to people when it isn't flooded (maybe parkland/football pitches), or land geared to inviting wildlife (and what happens to that when it floods), or wasteland? And what do you think should happen?

[CaptainPanic]

To answer your questions, allow me to link to a website which gives the complete oversight of all the projects that the Dutch have at this moment.

 

- Link 1 is the Dutch website, which contains the most info, including pictures, but all text is in Dutch.

- Link 2 is an English brochure (of the same projects), which explains in 8 pages what it's all about (.pdf!)

 

[edit]

And I also found an English wikipedia site. Not as good as previous links though.

Also this website contains some info. Clicking around in this last website will soon navigate away from current projects - but it does contain lots of interesting facts about the Netherlands and its water management.

Edited March 6, 2009 by CaptainPanic

[waitforufo]

Hi,

I'm new to this site, and wanted to get some opinions from people about rivers and building developments.

I'm doing some research looking at the kinds of developments that get built close to rivers, and what kinds of things get taken into account by the planners, developers, etc - environmental and ecological concerns, for instance? (I imagine that concerns for the local environment or ecosystems often comes a poor second to economics, but maybe I'm wrong!)

Does anyone have experience of this? Perhaps something through work or personally? My work is in the UK, but I would be interested to hear about experiences in other countries too.

Thanks for any thoughts people want to share!

 

 

Washington State in the US requires most cities and counties to have shoreline management plans. If they don't create them and get them approved by the state government, the state government imposes a plan on them. A good place to start looking is..

 

http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/sea/SMA/index.html

 

King County (where Seattle is) might be another good google search.