Urban Rewilding: Nature - based solutions for resilience and regeneration

Date: Wednesday, 17th September 2025

Time: 2:00pm - 3:00pm

The benefits of resilient green and blue spaces in Australia’s cities are well-known, well established, and permeate relevant policy and practice at all levels of government. This session explores the opportunities to build resilience in Sydney’s urban green and blue spaces using nature-based solutions. With inner-Sydney’s Botany Wetlands as a springboard for broader discussion, this session will focus on the different ways nature-based solutions can be applied in urban environments, unearthing ecological value and regenerative potential.

Chair

Professor Dan Penny, Associate Professor, The University of Sydney.

Panel

Associate Professor Jo Gillespie, Associate Professor in the School of Geosciences, Faculty of Science, The University of Sydney

Genevieve Wright, Planning & Strategy Project Officer, Disaster Risk Management (DRM) Branch, Adaptation & Mitigation, NSW Reconstruction Authority

Robert Allen, Sydney Water Corporation

Emily Fern Strautins, BSc(Hons), M.EM, Bushland Officer

Dan Penny is a Professor in the Faculty of Science at the University of Sydney. His research ranges from environmental histories of the global tropics through to Australian based environmental reconstructions. He applies expertise in palaeo-botany to document the long-term behaviour ecosystems, necessary for the definition of ecological baselines and restoration targets.

Jo Gillespie is a leading legal geography scholar and an Associate Professor in the School of Geosciences, Faculty of Science at the University of Sydney. Jo's research explores how legal frameworks and people/place connections both enable and disable environmental protection solutions.

Funded by the Sydney Environment Institute (SEI), Jo, Dan, and colleagues have been working on a project that investigates the regulations and environmental history of the Botany Wetlands, a 4.5 km corridor of freshwater wetlands and critically endangered native woodland habitats in Sydney's inner east. The wetlands filter stormwater runoff, accommodate floodwater, benefit human health, and represent an important refuge for plants and animals. The project provides authorities with a roadmap for the restoration of the wetland’s ecology and functional diversity.

Genevieve Wright is a Planning & Strategy Project Officer at the NSW Reconstruction Authority (RA), working on how nature-based measures can reduce disaster risk across NSW, informed by the NSW State Disaster Mitigation Plan. The RA was established to proactively reduce the impact of future disasters across NSW and to help communities recover from them faster. Genevieve has worked in the climate space for over five years, managing climate adaptation and disaster resilience research at the Sydney Environment Institute, including projects on reducing exposure to extreme heat and understanding how communities organise during and after disasters. She has also conducted research on the challenges of implementing nature-based solutions in partnership with AECOM and the Committee for Sydney. She holds a Master of Sustainability and is passionate about translating research insights into practical strategies that build sustainable and resilient communities.

Robert Allen is the Intergrated Stormwater Manager at Sydney Water. He manages a small team that undertakes condition assessment and maintenance planning across both civil and natural stormwater assets. His formal background is in Environmental Science and ecology, and he has a keen interest in restoring natural places to help connect local communities.

Emily Fern Strautins has spent the past 15 years devoted to understanding and restoring Sydney’s urban habitat, particularly critically endangered ‘Eastern Suburbs Banksia Scrub’. Through her career spanning wildlife research, bush regeneration, community activation and behaviour-change strategy she has sought to challenge assumptions about urban environments to re-kindle care and connection. Her work is deeply grounded in the knowledge that cultivating a resilient, biodiverse future begins at home – right here, in the blue-green spaces of the city.