Inner West hosts first ‘Living Lab’

Wednesday, 20 February 2019

Inner West Council’s Underwood Reserve in Summer Hill is hosting Australia’s first “Which Plant Where” Living Lab.

“Which Plant Where” is a joint Macquarie and Western Sydney universities climate change research project.

By testing a range of plants, bushes and trees under various climate conditions, researchers hope to find out which plants will become unsuitable, and which will flourish, in years to come.

Inner West Council is planting around 1,000 trees a year, according to Gwilym Griffiths, Council’s Urban Forest Manager.

He says it’s crucial that plant choice takes into consideration the long-term.

“Urban areas are highly contested spaces, and we need to get it right,” he said at the Living Lab’s launch.

“The challenges are only going to increase, with increased heat and the further development of urban areas. So when we plant trees we really need to make sure we’re maximising their success.

“In partnering with ‘Which Plant Where?’ we hope to achieve this maximisation. We want to make sure that the trees we’re planting are the right trees, and that they’re resilient for the future,” he said.

Researchers will monitor not only the plants performance, but also the environmental benefits.

As Western Sydney University researcher, Paul Rymer, explained; “The key part of the experiment is to look at what is the benefit of plantings … from capturing pollutants, cooling, soil health, and a range of different processes that we like to support, include biodiversity.”

The Summer Hill Living Lab leads the way for other on-ground collaborations to come, according to Macquarie University researcher, Leigh Staas, who says, “Living Labs are a really fantastic way for our researchers to collaborate with our end users, such as local councils.”

The result should be that clients and customers, whether councils or everyday consumers, can make more assured choices, and nurseries can offer more assured choices to them.

“What we’re really trying to do is create confidence,” says Leigh. “We can provide evidence-based research of how a plant performs across urban landscapes to growers and nurseries.

“This means growers can better plan what plants they’re putting out into the nurseries and into our urban landscape.”

For a print-quality image taken at the launch of the Living Lab project, contact the Communication team.

'Which Plant Where?' is funded by Hort Innovation, under the Hort Frontiers Green Cites Fund, and in partnership with Macquarie University, Western Sydney University (WSU) and the NSW Office of Heritage and the Environment

For media enquiries, contact Elizabeth Heath | Media and Communications Coordinator P: +61 2 9392 5334 | E: elizabeth.heath@innerwest.nsw.gov.au