Arup report urges cities to extend thinking on infrastructure beyond boundaries

City authorities and businesses worldwide fail to invest adequately in the water basins that supply them and a growing number of them risk running out of water if they do not improve the resilience of their water sources according to a report by Arup.

The report urges cities to consider infrastructure beyond their immediate environs with “upstream thinking” that encompasses “the entire river basin on which they depend.”

In its report Cities Alive: Water for People, Arup advises cities to expand what they might now consider “their’”water infrastructure to include the entire river basin on which they depend. It also outlines recommendations for successfully managing and maintaining water basins. According to the report: “Cities impact stewardship for hundreds of miles. They have the potential to influence how their water basins are managed, yet they invest very little in them.”

Arup’s global water leader, Dr Mark Fletcher, said: “Recognising the importance of the entire water basin is essential as urban water resilience is not possible without rural water resilience.” the report says Upstream thinking means “greater collaboration, working with landowners, businesses and local authorities further upstream to consider the water basin as a whole.”