Russell is a civil engineer with a passion for integrated, sustainable green urban form and function. As Senior Assets Lead with the City of Unley he continues to build on his private sector and local government experience by accessing specialist horticultural and arboricultural knowledge for green engineering projects from the scoping stage. Russell has formed and led design and construction teams on projects incorporating porous and permeable road and footpath pavements on reactive clay soil, ‘daylighting’ of urban stormwater systems, rain gardens for flow moderation and purification, and harvesting storm runoff for passive urban irrigation. Russell’s teams have won state, national and professional association awards for environmental leadership and sustainability, research, and for innovation. He focuses not only on the project outcomes but also on improving how councils deliver projects, on intergenerational equity, and on making the world a better place one project at a time. When he’s not in the office he might be on the ice hockey rink, searching out interesting cuisines around the world with his family, or perhaps just keeping his bees busy at home.
Treenet Symposium Speaker
Russell King
Speaker Biography
Session Abstract
Engineering for Trees
Heat islands, polluted and eroded waterways, noise, glare, biodiversity loss, local extinctions, ‘the ‘foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city’ (Banjo Patterson, 1889); urbanisation has created problems we’ve known about for centuries. In cities and towns, life suffers. With traditional engineering and urban design approaches problems have increased as city size has increased. More of the same can’t fix this. Solutions will be different, holistic, and focused on life. Traditional civil engineering design based on maximum soil strength and low water content is evolving to support urban green life that manages stormwater, moderates urban microclimates, and sustains the micro and macro biodiversity we can’t live without. This paper reports research and case studies that show green engineering can support life and engineering outcomes simultaneously. Research and working demonstrations are detailed that show infiltration devices and porous surfaces can provide effective stormwater management solutions in the road, on the verge, in the car park, and in private gardens. Green solutions support urban forests and the forests enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of the engineering, which together helps to restore nature’s circular economy and hydrology in urban areas.
