Where nature works.
A resilient city can absorb a heatwave or a flood and keep adapting as the climate warms. Nature does much of that work. Street trees, parks, creeks and wetlands cool neighbourhoods and manage stormwater, and where they go decides who benefits. Mesoscale’s urban research and strategy for nature in cities gives councils, water authorities, state agencies and developers the evidence to make informed, defensible decisions.
Mesoscale
nounThe middle scale of a city, bigger than a site and smaller than a region: its streets, neighbourhoods, precincts and catchments.
The middle scale in cities is where heat builds up, water finds its way and wildlife either gets through or gets stuck. It’s also where most decisions about urban nature are made, often with the least evidence. Site plans look too closely and regional strategies too broadly. As a result, the value a tree, a park or a creek adds at this scale often goes uncounted. We start there and work across scales, down to the single tree and up to the region.
How we’re different
We see cities as systems
Cities are connected human, natural and water systems. Heat, water, wildlife and people cross property and council boundaries. We trace how a decision in one street plays out across the neighbourhood and catchment, so money does the most good without pushing problems downstream.
We do our own research
When a decision needs evidence that doesn’t yet exist, we produce it. Mesoscale is a research practice as well as a consultancy, and we work closely with leading urban researchers in Australia. Together we turn new research into practical evidence that councils and state agencies can use.
We think in decades
A street tree may take 20 years to deliver its full benefits, and it will grow into a hotter climate than the one it was planted in. We think about the way canopy, landscapes and the communities around them will change over that time, so a strategy outlives the budget cycle that paid for it.
We strengthen planning and design teams
Landscape architects, urban designers and planners shape the places. We give them the analysis behind their decisions and name the trade-offs plainly, such as a shade tree and a bike lane competing for the same metre of verge. Good strategy resolves those conflicts on the evidence.
What we do
- Develop open space, urban greening, urban forest, cooling and catchment management strategies
- Analyse tree canopy, open space and urban water, from single streets to whole cities
- Map and model urban heat and the communities most exposed to it
- Turn research into evidence for government, planners and urban designers
Who we are
Mesoscale is led by Dr Dom Blackham, an urban green infrastructure specialist who has worked on issues at the intersection of people, nature and cities for 25 years. Dom has directed and delivered urban forest, greening and open space strategies for councils and state agencies across Australia and beyond, most recently as a founding member of Mosaic Insights. One urban greening analysis he led found that every $1 invested returns $4 in benefits over 30 years.
His work on green infrastructure and urban resilience has informed government and industry across Australasia and, more recently, in Asia. Mesoscale works closely with planners and urban designers, giving them the evidence behind their decisions, and draws on a network of ecologists and researchers to bring the right expertise to each project.
Get in touch
If you’re planning green and blue infrastructure, we’d like to hear from you.