Abstract
Climate change impacts, ageing infrastructure and the increasing imperviousness of cities all raise enormous challenges to and call for new ways of planning for sustainable urban stormwater management. Especially, closer collaboration among a diverse set of actors involved has been pointed to as critical to enable the development of holistic and flexible approaches. However, the shift towards inclusive forms of planning has been slow, and characterized by technical and institutional lock-ins. Against this background, this study scrutinizes the challenges and developments perceived as central for improving stormwater planning, and analyzes how formal and informal institutional change could contribute to enhancing sustainability in this sector. Building on an analysis of data from workshops, interviews and a survey with Swedish planners and water managers, we suggest new strategies for integrating stormwater concerns into planning processes, overcoming silo structures, fostering cocreation cultures, and securing the continuation and implementation of stormwater management through various planning stages.
Highlights
The appropriateness of conventional stormwater management relying on piped drainage systems is being increasingly questioned in the light of critical sustainability challenges
In the subsequent section we present the theoretical concepts associated with formal and informal institutions that have shaped our understanding of the dynamics and change in this sector
Special attention is paid to the role of formal and informal institutions for understanding current sector dynamics, as well as ways forward towards a more enabling institutional context
Summary
The appropriateness of conventional stormwater management relying on piped drainage systems is being increasingly questioned in the light of critical sustainability challenges. There is an emerging consensus that a larger proportion of stormwater should be managed above ground, via alternative control measures designed to mimic the natural functions of pre-development hydrology [7] Such sustainable stormwater strategies aim to minimize impervious cover by promoting infiltration, ponding and the harvesting of rainwater. The Swedish water sector has been influenced by international trends of the reregulation of utility markets, which has been ongoing since the mid-1980s [11] This has implied the introduction of business management principles, including contractual relations and competitiveness, into a policy domain, which historically has been governed by public utility traditions and norms. In this reformed institutional structure, stormwater management is usually the responsibility of the same utility company that manages drinking water and wastewater systems
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