The workshops
Over the last month, RRC coordinated three catchment partnership learning workshops, with support from the Environment Agency and the CaBA support team. The events (held in Sheffield, Bristol, and London) focused on strengthening the project monitoring, evaluation and reporting skills of partnerships, specifically:
At the end of January I went up to Blackpool to look at the site visit for the 2016 RRC Annual Conference. The visit was also a good opportunity to see what other work the Wyre Catchment Partnership have been doing and have planned for the future.
I recently had the pleasure of reading Martin Luther King Jnr’s autobiography. It’s an excellent read. Rather unexpectedly, a short extract written by King in 1953 during his Education at Crozer Theological Seminary stood out in relation to river restoration.
Chiara Magliozzi is completing a PhD at Cranfield University, jointly supervised by the Cranfield Water Science Institute (CWSI) and the RRC.
In November RRC attended the Rivers Trust Autumn Conference hosted by the Severn Rivers Trust in the spectacular Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site, Shropshire. It was exciting to see the great work being done for our rivers, and to find out about what the Rivers Trusts are planning for the coming months and years.
Here are some of our key take home points from the event.
After a weekend of devastating flooding here in the UK, we have again seen the impact of unprecedented rainfall events and the difficulties of trying to 'protect' towns and cities. Managing our rivers and catchments better and restoring their ability to absorb extremes of climate will support the work done in vulnerable urban locations to manage their risk. Our sympathies go out to all those affected.
In November I was asked to attend a European Parliament workshop discussing how best to use the new €3.46 Billion LIFE budget to support Environment and Climate, the two elements that LIFE now covers. RRC, on behalf of the LIFE+ RESTORE partners, was chosen as one of two outstanding LIFE projects (from over 4000 others) to highlight key areas of ambition within the new programme.
A final 'RRC staff' blog entry from Ulrika Aberg, whilst she gets settled in her new desk overlooking the lake in Luzern.......
"I worked as Restoration Adviser for the RRC for almost three years, and have now left to take up a new position at Eawag (the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology) in Luzern, Switzerland.
Introducing Nicola
Nicola joined us at the beginning of September as the new RRC administrator! She has written a few words for us.
Our final Members Site Visit of the year began close to confluence of the Irfon and Wye at Caer Beris Manor Hotel in Builth Wells. The Irfon was the subject of our visit, which was kindly hosted by Simon Evans from the Wye and Usk Foundation.
During the day, the 18 keen participants managed to visit three very different sites across the catchment. These were all part of the Irfon Special Area of Conservation Project (ISAC), a LIFE+ funded project which was completed in 2014.