Play-full resilience and climate adaptation – and renewed purpose

Maybe we wake up and there ‘it’ is. Purpose. The force that drives us. Makes our eyes light up, hands fly-flap and voice rise as we talk passionately about our ‘thing’. At times, this purpose is murky, clouded by the endless shopping list of competing issues. And at other times, it punches through in bursts of crystal sunshine as the clouds move over – and for a moment, the magic that crystalises heart and mind, is reorientated and in focus. These moments pass, but if we’re lucky they will burst through again, as transpired a few days ago.

A Guardian article “Hoboken New Jersey Kids Play Stomwater Capture Zone Playground” (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jan/03/hoboken-new-jersey-kids-play-stormwater-capture-zone-playground) was one such moment of sunshine. The title sums it up, so no need to unpack the detail, other than to remark on how it manages some of the complexities that I encountered in exploring similar ideas in my hometown, Cape Town.

Cape Town’s ‘day zero’ drought forced deep thinking around our relationship with water, in its many guises. This thinking solidified into the design for the Adderley Street Fountain and Grachts – a public space in the city’s downtown (CBD). The conceptual design includes a reservoir for groundwater harvested from the City of Cape Town’s Civic Centre basements and treatment plant with the intention to re-use the water in the fountain and broader precinct for non-potable purposes. Most of this infrastructure would be hidden beneath a new park within a rapidly changing urban context catalysed by COVID-19 work-live changes manifesting in conversions of office buildings into residential units. More homes in the city centre bodes well for a more balanced land-use across the broader city, but it also necessitates investment in social facilities, such as parks. For me the magic in this conceptual thinking is the potential for greater water resilience in city’s economic heart and the application of water sensitive design using a fit-for-purpose approach integrated into other forms of infrastructure – roads and parks.

The paragraph above describes a very different way of designing, which will also require a radical departure in operations in maintenance. Red flags should be popping up everywhere at this point. Particularly for those familiar with how local government typically works. Cities aggregate people and the services they require are at a bulk scale delivered via centralised infrastructure networks managed by discrete departments that typically deliver a single service.

Infrastructure that integrates a variety of different elements located across different departments doesn’t fit into this paradigm. The Adderely Street Fountain and Grachts project exemplifies this conundrum. Is it a road project? Bulk water? Alternative water? Stormwater? Park? Economic?

Why does this matter? In local government, assets (road, park, fountain etc.) must have an asset owner who is responsible for the operations and maintenance of the asset. The asset is recorded on the responsible department’s asset register with the associated legal and financial implications. Local governments don’t typically have departments that are responsible for non-standard assets. And most departments will baulk at ownership of any asset that isn’t narrowly defined and aligned to their core function. And those that do, will manage it according to their core function. This can be deeply frustrating to practitioners wanting to use stormwater ponds as play areas. Hurdles strewn across the path of best intentions include safety concerns that results in the installation of fencing around the asset that prevents use and sterilizes the space, ensuring it’s single-use in perpetuity. Practitioners such as myself, have had progress with the planning and design part of a department who buy in, but whose colleagues scupper things by refusing to maintain an asset that doesn’t meet their requirements.

What I like about the cited article, is that the infrastructure is not designed and built by the city, but rather by Trust for Public Land, an intermediary non-profit. This is exciting because it illustrates a different way of designing infrastructure for climate adaptation and resilience – and ‘play’. Overcoming outdated governance that ignores the complex nature of urban environments will be key in accelerating the implementation of these types of projects; as will developing new ways of working that recognises the importance of the public realm in delivering these projects; in addition to different funding mechanisms and partnerships.

These brief moments ‘between the clouds’ are gold and the reinforcement of the validation of my thinking from afar is a welcome elixir to what can sometimes feel like very cloudy days. If Hoboken can, Cape Town can.