Climate change impacts affecting coastal areas, such as sea-level rise and storm surge events, are expected to have significant social, economic and environmental consequences worldwide. Ongoing population growth and development in highly urbanised coastal areas will exacerbate the predicted impacts on coastal settlements. Improving the adaptation potential of highly vulnerable coastal communities will require greater levels of planning and policy integration across sectors and scales. However, to date, there is little evidence in the literature which demonstrates how climate policy integration is being achieved. This paper contributes to this gap in knowledge by drawing on the example provided by the process of developing cross-sectoral climate change adaptation policies and programmes generated for three coastal settlement types as part of the South East Queensland Climate Adaptation Research Initiative (SEQCARI), a 3-year multisectoral study of climate change adaptation options for human settlements in South East Queensland, Australia. In doing so, we first investigate the benefits and challenges to cross-sectoral adaptation to address climate change broadly and in coastal areas. We then describe how cross-sectoral adaptation policies and programmes were generated and appraised involving the sectors of urban planning and management, coastal management, emergency management, human health and physical infrastructure as part of SEQCARI. The paper concludes by discussing key considerations that can inform the development and assessment of cross-sectoral climate change adaptation policies and programmes in highly urbanised coastal areas.

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With increasing worldwide recognition of the influence of urban development on the hydrological functions of water, there is growing pressure for urban planning to play a greater role in water resources management in urban regions. Planning for green open spaces in particular can play an important role, as they have the potential to contribute to sustaining ecosystem services that assist flood management. It has been argued that interconnected and strategically planned networks of green open spaces should be planned for early in landuse planning and design processes, with consideration of water-related ecosystem values and landscape functions in concert with land development, growth management and built infrastructure planning. Although there is growing recognition of the importance of green open space planning for water sensitive cities and supportive planning measures, there are few analyses of the actual inclusion of this recognition in plans and strategies, or the presence of related actions and planning mechanisms. This paper addresses this gap by comparatively analysing the approaches taken to regional green open space planning in three Australian capital city-regions. Findings indicate the acknowledgement of relationships between flood regulation and green open space planning and various associated planning mechanisms. However, there is limited explicit integration of flood management and green open spaces planning, and significant on-ground barriers to enabling this integration to occur given the legacy of past planning decisions and the lack of information to support implementation. The paper concludes with recommendations for further research to assist planning for green open spaces as an ally to ecosystem services relating to flood management.

Water sensitive interventions are being promoted to reduce the adverse impacts of urban development on natural water cycles. However it is currently difficult to know the best strategy for their implementation because current and desired urban water performance is not well quantified. This is particularly at the city-region scale, which is important for strategic urban planning. This work aimed to fill this gap by quantifying the water performance of urban systems within city-regions using 'urban water metabolism' evaluation, to inform decisions about water sensitive interventions. To do this we adapted an existing evaluation framework with new methods. In particular, we used land use data for defining system boundaries, and for estimating natural hydrological flows. The criteria for gauging the water performance were water efficiency (in terms of water extracted externally) and hydrological performance (how much natural hydrological flows have changed relative to a nominated pre-urbanised state). We compared these performance criteria for urban systems within three Australian city-regions (South East Queensland, Melbourne and Perth metropolitan areas), under current conditions, and after implementation of example water sensitive interventions (demand management, rainwater/stormwater harvesting, wastewater recycling and increasing perviousness). The respective water efficiencies were found to be 79, 90 and 133 kL/capita/yr. In relation to hydrological performance, stormwater runoff relative to pre-urbanised flows was of most note, estimated to be 2-, 6- and 3- fold, respectively. The estimated performance benefits from water sensitive interventions suggested different priorities for each region, and that combined implementation of a range of interventions may be necessary to make substantive gains in performance. We concluded that the framework is suited to initial screening of the type and scale of water sensitive interventions needed to achieve desired water performance objectives.

The current fabric of urban areas is largely the result of past land development and land-use planning decisions. Historically, there was relatively little consideration of the impact of these decisions upon hydrological systems within and outside urban areas. Despite their close relationship, urban and regional planning and water resources management have typically been carried out separately and guided by different institutional arrangements. The range of impacts of urbanisation on hydrological systems at the cityregion scale, and the dependence of urbanised areas upon these systems, call for better integration between the sectors of urban and regional planning and water resources management to ensure the sustainability and resilience of cities and their regions to future changes and uncertainties. This paper evaluates the extent to which planning mechanisms currently support integration between land-use and water resource sectors. The evaluation draws on a comparative analysis of 113 statutory and non-statutory planning mechanisms in three Australian capital city-regions: South East Queensland, and the Melbourne and Perth metropolitan regions. Results indicate that the function of water at the city-region scale, including its role in supporting environmental connectivity, needs to be better understood and considered by land-use planning systems; improved institutional capacity is required to enable both sectors to deal with future changes and uncertainties related to water resources; and emergent planning trends supportive of the consideration of water connectivity at the city-region scale are yet to be fully implemented. Based on the results, the paper concludes by exploring how the concept of urban metabolism may facilitate better integration between the two sectors, along with the identification of best suited planning mechanisms and needed changes in governance and institutional arrangements conducive to integration.

Neste artigo, os autores discutem a utilização de grupos focais e de planejamento com cenários envolvendo stakeholders e pesquisadores como instrumentos metodológicos em estudos qualitativos sobre risco, tanto para aferir percepções, identificar demandas, discutir propostas e soluções, como para promover a participação de uma comunidade ampliada de pares na produção de dados e no enfrentamento dos riscos associados a eventos extremos e mudanças ambientais. A partir deste recorte temático e metodológico os autores apresentam e analisam resultados de dois estudos realizados no Litoral Norte paulista (Brasil) e na parte Norte da costa de Queensland (Austrália), entre 2011 e 2013. Tais estudos apontam que os instrumentos metodológicos explorados alcançaram os objetivos propostos, contribuindo, em particular, para estreitar o diálogo e articulação entre cientistas e stakeholders.

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Improving resource management in urban areas has been enshrined in visions for achieving sustainable urban areas, but to date it has been difficult to quantify performance indicators to help identify more sustainable outcomes, especially for water resources. In this work, we advance quantitative indicators for what we refer to as the 'metabolic' features of urban water management: those related to resource efficiency (for water and also water-related energy and nutrients), supply internalisation, urban hydrological performance, sustainable extraction, and recognition of the diverse functions of water. We derived indicators in consultation with stakeholders to bridge this gap between visions and performance indicators. This was done by first reviewing and categorising water-related resource management objectives for city-regions, and then deriving indicators that can gauge performance against them. The ability for these indicators to be quantified using data from an urban water mass balance was also examined. Indicators of water efficiency, supply internalisation, and hydrological performance (relative to a reference case) can be generated using existing urban water mass balance methods. In the future, indicators for water-related energy and nutrient efficiencies could be generated by overlaying the urban water balance with energy and nutrient data. Indicators of sustainable extraction and recognising diverse functions of water will require methods for defining sustainable extraction rates and a water functionality index.