Open Space Sustainable Water Management Strategy

The Open Space Sustainable Water Management Strategy provides direction and targets for alternative water supply within the municipality. CPG Australia has been engaged by Bayside City Council to develop a Sustainable Water Management Strategy (SWMS) to provide direction and targets for alternative water supply within the municipality. The Council provided a list of recreational and open space reserves which have been deemed high priority from a community and Council perspective. Historically Melbourne has relied on a centralised water management approach to
provide high quality water and the City of Bayside has relied on this centralised supply source to meet its demands for water. The legacy of this approach is that Council will continue to rely on the reticulated supply at least in the short term, while augmentation of the system through projects such as desalination will provide increased security of supply. The drought experienced over the past decade is impacting upon the ability to access freshwater supplies. In addition, our communities are continuing to grow and this growth is placing an ever-increasing demand on our water supply systems. Coupled with the impacts of climate change, our water supplies are going to become even more scarce and valuable.
Within Melbourne this has resulted in moderate to severe water restrictions, impacting upon industry, residents, tourism and recreational activities and it is apparent that we will no longer be able to rely on the same water supplies to meet ur needs and those of the environment as we have in the past. These severe water restrictions have recently been relaxed. The current restriction for sportsgrounds is now based on an annual volume of 3000 kilolitres per hectare. The SWMS establishes the framework to capture the existing City of Bayside water initiatives and provides recommendations for long term strategic direction to maintain parks, sportsgrounds and reserves. The framework is based on the “Water Sensitive Cities” concept which is emerging as a best practice approach for sustainable urban
water management. This approach has evolved from initiatives such as development of the Clean Stormwater Planning Framework, which Council led on behalf of the Association of Bayside Municipalities. It was formally recognised with the establishment of the Centre for Water Sensitive Cities at Monash University. Stormwater harvesting has been identified as the most viable option both regionally and locally and is therefore considered the primary alternative water source for the City of Bayside. Broad targets have been established however options for specific locations will be based on local need and opportunities. For some areas stormwater may provide opportunities however other areas may still require water from the reticulated water system. The existing and future Council projects will help achieve a target of 55 – 85% by 2030 of water use from alternative water sources.