Are sponge cities the solution to China's growing urban flooding problems?

Abstract

Nature-based solutions have been promoted as a sustainable solution for urban stormwater management and they are currently adopted at an unprecedented speed and scale to build sponge cities in China, with a primary aim to solving urban flood problems. However, there are limits to how much rainfall sponge cities can absorb, hence, they are unlikely to be a panacea for flooding problems in cities. We argue that bottom-up community-based measures are essential part of the intervention development framework that is required to transform sponge cities into flood resilient cities. This community-based approach can effectively build on the distinctive and unique feature of Chinese cities, that is, the prevalence of gated communities, which provides a solid foundation for implementing community-based measures for flood management. A range of such community-based measures including resilience mapping, property-based resistant and resilient measures, flood insurance, and social resilience building are discussed. Flood resilience building does not just mean investments in gray-green-blue infrastructure, it requires social transformation toward flood resilient communities. This article provides a roadmap for the next stage development of sponge cities which plays a key role in coping with extreme storm events and adapting to climate change in cities.

Perception of sponge city for achieving circularity goal and hedge against climate change: a study on Weibo

“…Sponge city residents are satisfied with the travel and living conditions and strongly support the local government (Luo et al, 2022). Fu et al (2022) believed that bottom-up community-based approaches are essential to transform sponge cities into flood-resistant ones.…”

“…It solves urban surface water flooding problems and improves urban water resource management (Wang et al, 2021b). Nature-based solutions for sponge city have been promoted as sustainable solutions for urban stormwater management and addressing the urban flooding problem (Fu et al, 2022). To improve the assessment of the hydrological cycle and sponge city's options, Jiang and McBean (2021) used the concept of "One Water" to demonstrate structured thinking about how each dimension of the hydrological cycle could be used to study the degree of interrelationships.…”

“…Positive sentiment accounted for 76.8%, which was fourth times higher than negative one (18.5%, Figure 9), confirming sponge city might help city branding online. Although Fu et al (2022) held that there is a limit to how much rainfall sponge cities can absorb, they are unlikely to be a panacea for urban flooding problems. Uncertainty in sponge city design and planning and insufficient funding are the most severe issues that can IJCCSM lead to the failure of the sponge city concept (Nguyen et al, 2019).…”

“…Sponge city construction has many problems and controversies due to high construction costs, a lack of technical guideline, high management costs and low management efficiency (Zhang et al, 2019). Fu et al (2022) doubted whether sponge cities provided appropriate solutions to China's growing urban flooding problems: it needs all stakeholders' joint efforts (Gu and Cui, 2017). On the other hand, sponge city provides solutions to water hazards and disasters and improves the urban environment and human well-being.…”

China’s public health initiatives for climate change adaptation

“…They are effective for flood risk reduction; however, they are unlikely to be a panacea for flooding problems in cities as they cannot deal with low-probability and high-damage events. 63 The evident technological disparities and constraints between developing and developed countries must be addressed. 64 Factors such as the unavailability and uncertainty of rain garden systems, green roof systems, tree planters, infiltration planter systems, and underground infiltration and monitoring systems can pose significant challenges to the effective implementation of adaptive measures.…”