House And Garden Design To Beat The Elements
House And Garden Design To Beat The Elements
Functional house and garden design to help mitigate natural hazards and handle extremes in climate
Capacity to Deliver -
LEP23-005-Weddin-02_LLC_002
The issue
The Weddin district has faced a series of challenging natural disasters in recent years, with prolonged drought from 2017- 2019, followed closely by COVID-19, then flooding, intense hailstorms and constant bushfire risk impacting the community. With weather becoming increasingly unpredictable there is a need for the community to be better informed about not only the services available to help respond to natural disasters, but also ways that people can work towards lessening the impact on themselves, their property and the local environment.
The solution
With funding from Landcare NSW’s People Led Prevention Project, the Central West Landcare region ran a roadshow of events and shared keynote speaker Graham Ross AM from Better Homes and Gardens. Graham was engaged to speak about functional garden design to help mitigate natural hazards and handle extremes in climate.
Weddin Landcare focused on house and garden design to withstand harsh weather and mitigate risk from natural disasters in the urban environment for our event. This involved engaging local representatives from SES and RFS and an architectural firm renowned for their functional building designs in the Central West.
The SES and RFS shared practical information on how to prepare your property and home against natural hazards such as fire, flood and storms. They offered the opportunity for community members to ask questions and had ample handouts for participants to take home.
Sally Sutherland from Source Architects in Orange discussed some of the considerations of home design to help reduce the impact of extremes in climate. She referenced projects undertaken to meet bushfire zone requirements and ways to redirect harsh sunlight as well as materials available to withstand the elements.
Weddin Community Native Nursery produced a handout on fire resistant plants and they opened the nursery after the event for participants to purchase plants.
The impact
Participants were left with clear ideas on how to improve their property and what to do should they be impacted by natural disasters. Having such a well-known speaker like Graham Ross meant we had over 130 people in the room to engage with our local services and representatives.
Community engagement was positive with participants still excited about the event in the week following and many participants had travelled from out of town and were introduced to Weddin Landcare and the Weddin Community Native Nursery.
Key facts
- 130 people attended the event and are now better prepared for natural disasters.
- Working with the other groups in the region meant we had a shared starting point and opportunity to tailor our own event around a big drawcard.
- 12 out-of-town visitors discovered the Weddin Community Native Nursery and made purchases.