Tag: flood | ArchDaily

Absorb, Filter, Store: 9 Projects Showcasing How Sponge Cities Adapt to Climate Challenges

Moises Carrasco — Thu, 06 Feb 2025 04:00:00 +0000

The concept of "sponge cities" has gained prominence since it was introduced by Chinese landscape architect Kongjian Yu, founder of Turenscape, and was officially adopted as a national policy in China in 2013 to combat urban flooding. This approach prioritizes nature-based infrastructure such as wetlands, rain gardens, and permeable pavements, creating landscapes with porous soil where native plants can thrive with minimal maintenance. When it rains, these systems absorb and slow down water flow, reducing flood risks. In contrast, traditional concrete- and pipe-based drainage solutions, though widely used, are costly, rigid, and require frequent maintenance, sometimes even making cities more vulnerable to flooding due to blockages and overflows.

Urban Landscape as an "Art of Survival”: An interview with Kongjian Yu, the Advocate of the Sponge Cities Concept

Camilla Ghisleni — Sun, 23 Jun 2024 07:30:00 +0000

Alarming cases of climate disasters are a constant presence in world news. Last month's floods in southern Brazil gained special attention from heat waves and forest fires to droughts and cyclones. This tragedy, which left over half a million people homeless, was understood to be the result of a combination of factors, including human actions that have devastated ecosystems to create environmentally irresponsible cities.

Floods in Rio Grande do Sul: The Tragedy of Non-Resilient Cities

Camilla Ghisleni — Sat, 18 May 2024 07:30:00 +0000

The world has changed, and accepting this fact is no longer a matter of choice but survival. Our rainfall patterns, periods of drought, average temperatures, sea levels—everything is in constant flux. The denialist stance of many countries, including Brazil, has led to catastrophic situations like the one we are facing now.

MVRDV Wins Competition to Design the Master Plan for a Taiwanese Town’s Water Network

Maria-Cristina Florian — Wed, 04 Jan 2023 06:30:00 +0000

International office MVRDV has been selected by the Taiwan Ministry of Economic Affairs to design the Hoowave Water Factory, a large-scale redevelopment of Huwei’s Beigang and Anqingzhen waterways. The project combines a strategic master plan with the landscape design in an effort to move beyond the mono-functional approach for controlling and distributing water. Besides storing and capturing water, the proposal also opens up access to the river and the natural ecosystem by integrating cycling paths, cultural amenities, and ecological systems. The master plan also includes a comprehensive strategy for flood resilience while improving the quantity and quality of available water. The project is expected to be completed in 2026.

Venice Authorities Install Glass Barriers at St Mark’s Basilica to Prevent Flooding

Paula Cano — Mon, 02 Jan 2023 05:30:00 +0000

The Italian city installed glass barriers around the 900-year-old church to keep the waters out. The decision was made after near-record flooding in December 2022, preventing a repeat of the November 2019 near-catastrophe that aged parts of the building “20 years in a day,” according to Basilica’s Procuratoria governing body. The temporary structure is fixed until the MOSE system fully works by the end of 2025, protecting the city of Venice, Italy, and the Venetian Lagoon from flooding.

Floodwaters Threaten Once More The Farnsworth House

Christele Harrouk — Thu, 21 May 2020 05:30:00 +0000

Built in a flood plain along the Fox River, the Farnsworth House, designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is endangered again. Floodwaters are threatening the modernist house once more, as water levels are rising to reach the top of the house’s steel columns, covering its lower terrace.

Behind India's Ambitious Plan to Create the World's Longest River

Suneet Zishan Langar — Wed, 16 Aug 2017 09:30:00 +0000

Against the backdrop of an ever-increasing number of its farmers committing suicides, and its cities crumbling under intensifying pressure on their water resources—owing to their rapidly growing populations—India has revived its incredibly ambitious Interlinking of Rivers (ILR) project which aims to create a nation-wide water-grid twice the length of the Nile. The $168 billion project, first envisioned almost four decades ago, entails the linkage of thirty-seven of the country’s rivers through the construction of thirty canals and three-thousand water reservoirs. The chief objective is to address India’s regional inequity in water availability: 174 billion cubic meters of water is proposed to be transported across river basins, from potentially water-surplus to water-deficit areas.