About SPARE

Space for resilience - how do we plan for stormwater, biodiversity and recreation to increase urban resilience?

The SPARE project (November 2021 - October 2025) is a Collaborative Project to meet Societal and Industry-related Challenges funded by the Norwegian Research Council and led by the Norwegian Institute for Water Research. SPARE has gathered a multidisciplinary consortium with partners from research, business and public administration. We will jointly work on providing new knowledge, evidence-based management approaches and tools to better integrate stormwater management, biodiversity support and recreation in urban land-use management by use of blue-green infrastructures and thus increase the space for resilience.

Objectives and research activities

The primary objective of SPARE is to provide knowledge, develop tools and test management approaches for a stronger inclusion of stormwater, biodiversity and recreation in urban land-use management and thereby increase space for resilience.

Main research activities of SPARE include:

Uncover policy conflicts challenging the implementation of SPARE-management,
Increase our understanding on how design and maintenance of blue-green infrastructure – including re-surfaced streams, other blue-green infrastructures with aquatic components and urban trees – contribute to urban biodiversity and how synergistic effects for biodiversity, stormwater and recreation can be created at the landscape level
Develop and apply city-wide accounting mechanisms for costs and benefits of blue-green infrastructures and enable also reporting for UN Sustainable development goals
Develop, test and evaluate interventions and polycentric management approaches for stronger involvement of citizens and to foster cross-sectoral cooperation for integrated stormwater, biodiversity and recreation management.
Integrate relevant findings from all WPs into tools or tangible outputs, which can be used by the cooperation partners and are easily transferable to other municipalities

Objectives

Work packages

WP1: Establish common frames of reference

Lead: Isabel Seifert-Dähnn (NIVA)

In WP1, we aim to better understand the policy conflicts challenging the implementation of SPARE management, understand historic urban land-use developments and detect future trends. We will pave the way for stronger political anchorage and multi-actor exchange of management practice, experience and knowledge.

WP2: Blue-green infrastructures for integrated stormwater, recreation and biodiversity management

Lead: Erik Stange (NINA)

WP2 addresses gaps in our understanding of how design and maintenance of blue-green infrastructures —including re-surfaced streams, other blue-green infrastructures with aquatic components and urban trees—contribute to urban biodiversity. We will explore the broader spatial context of urban land conditions, combined with site-specific investigations of blue-green infrastructure biodiversity, to support and facilitate broader implementation of multifunctional blue-green infrastructures with synergistic effects for biodiversity, stormwater and recreation at the landscape level.

WP3: Economic and financial assessment and accounting for blue-green infrastructures

Lead: David Barton (NINA)

In WP3 we address knowledge gaps in financial and economic justification for blue-green infrastructures at property and city level. On city level we will account for total effects on ecosystem services for the purpose of municipal reporting on municipal sustainable development goals (SDGs) and monitoring of planning implementation.

WP4: Increasing citizen engagement

Lead: Ingvild Skumlien Furuseth (NIVA)

The objective of WP4 is to develop and test incentive programs (financial and non-financial) in order to engage citizens to implement blue-green infrastructures on their private property or to contribute to the implementation or maintenance of blue-green infrastructures on public spaces. This will help enable urban land-use management beyond the limited available public space as well as increase citizens' awareness for blue-green infrastructures.

WP5: Cross-sectoral polycentric collaborative SPARE-management

Lead: Håkon Iversen (Pådriv)

The objective of WP5 is to research, explore, develop and pilot open, novel polycentric collaborative processes and organizational models that mobilize and empower a wide range of stakeholders to collaboratively advance SPARE-management integrated in urban land-use planning, with a main emphasis on built-up areas. WP 5 will be tailored for the city of Oslo, but the methodology developed and applied as well as the findings and results obtained will be made relevant and accessible for other cities, as both a guidance and an inspiration for their own SPARE-strategies.

WP6: Knowledge integration, decision and management support tools

Lead: Isabel Seifert-Dähnn (NIVA)

The aim of WP6 is to integrate relevant findings from all WPs into tools or tangible outputs, which can be used by the cooperation partners and are easily transferable to other municipalities.

Work packages