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SUMMARY:"Reconciliation ecology" and urban rivers
DTSTART:20120327T161500
DTSTAMP:20260920T110313Z
UID:c6cdba895983fae5674168181066cd59150c50778a6f19cfc05ca395
CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars
DESCRIPTION:Dr Rob Francis\, Dept. of Geography\, King's College London\, 
 UK\nThe relationships between physical habitat heterogeneity/complexity an
 d biodiversity are well established over a range of spatial scales\, and a
 cross a spectrum of natural to artificial environmental contexts. It is pe
 rhaps within urban systems that ecological engineering of anthropogenic ha
 bitats has the greatest potential to improve degraded ecological quality\,
  following the principles of ‘reconciliation ecology’. Urban rivers in
  particular are often heavily engineered and have suffered a substantial r
 eduction in ecological quality. Because they may appear ecologically poor 
 and offer relatively few opportunities for conservation and restoration of
  biodiversity and ecosystem services\, ecological investigations of such s
 ystems are rare. Usually\, environmental research and improvements focus o
 n water quality issues\, while more detailed research on the habitats and 
 biodiversity of such rivers is generally absent. Most rivers in heavily ur
 banised areas maintain flood defence walls and embankments as part of thei
 r engineering modifications\, and which may superficially be considered to
  be ecologically hostile. However\, work along the River Thames through ce
 ntral London has established that the flood defence walls of this highly e
 ngineered urban river may support relatively high plant diversity\, with 9
 0 species being found along surveyed sections of the wall in 2009. Other i
 nvestigations have established that the wall plant assemblages and diversi
 ty are controlled via a mix of landscape and local factors\, including riv
 er constriction\, wash frequency\, wall material type and wall physical co
 mplexity. Comparison of seeds transported through the system (the potentia
 l diversity) with those species found growing on the walls (expressed dive
 rsity) have highlighted that many more species (+50%) could establish on t
 he walls if suitable habitat conditions were present. Consequently\, the p
 otential exists for substantial improvement of biodiversity on the walls\,
  if habitat can be ecologically engineered following the principles of rec
 onciliation ecology\, whereby modifications ensure that societal use is no
 t compromised by increased availability for nonhuman species. Such develop
 ments will require a close and ongoing collaboration between ecologists an
 d engineers.
LOCATION:GR A3 31 http://plan.epfl.ch/?room=GR%20A3%2031
STATUS:CONFIRMED
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