Summer 2025 was the warmest on record in the UK, and one in four properties in England are likely to be at risk of flooding by the middle of the century. This puts local authorities under increasing pressure to keep places functioning as climate impacts intensify.
Flooding, overheating, constrained sewer capacity and declining urban nature are all significant challenges facing our towns and cities today – but they are often addressed street-by-street, rather than through large-scale infrastructure projects.
At the same time, public capital is under pressure. Councils are being asked to deliver more resilience, support growth and protect communities with fewer resources and less funding.
The UK already has a strong evidence base for nature- based solutions. Sustainable drainage systems, rain gardens, green roofs and restored river corridors are proven tools for managing water, cooling neighbourhoods and improving biodiversity. Many councils have well developed strategies that make the case for them.
What is holding delivery back is governance. Much of the urban fabric that creates flood risk or heat stress, for example, lies in our streets, business estates and mixed use neighbourhoods, with fragmented ownership and unclear responsibility for long-term care.
Nature-based infrastructure works best when planned as a system, often aligned to river catchments, transport networks or heat islands, rather than administrative boundaries. That system-thinking approach sits uncomfortably with funding mechanisms that are short-term, site-specific or dependent on individual developments.
If climate resilience is to move from pilots to everyday practice, councils need delivery models that work across boundaries, bring multiple stakeholders together and remain accountable over time.
One solution is an Eco Business Improvement District (EcoBID) model, an adaptation of the BID framework already familiar to councils, to focus on place-based environmental outcomes. It pools contributions from occupiers, landowners and other stakeholders to fund and maintain green and blue infrastructure.
A key benefit of this approach is long-term governance. EcoBIDs are time-limited and subject to re-balloting. That creates ongoing accountability and avoids locking councils into arrangements that don't keep pace with changing environmental or social conditions.
Nature-based infrastructure, delivered through local partnerships, can help unlock progress across several areas where councils are currently constrained.
For flood risk and drainage, slowing, storing and cleaning water before it reaches combined sewer networks can significantly reduce surface water flooding and pressure on ageing infrastructure. This is particularly valuable in dense urban areas, where traditional upgrades are costly, disruptive and difficult to retrofit. Distributed measures such as rain gardens and swales offer a practical way to manage risk while improving streets and public spaces.
This has direct implications for housing delivery. In many towns and cities, limited foul and surface water capacity is now a constraint on new homes and regeneration. Strategic investment in sustainable drainage and water management can protect existing capacity, allowing new developments to connect to existing networks without triggering major infrastructure upgrades.
Trees, open water, green roofs and permeable surfaces can lower surface and air temperatures, provide shade and improve thermal comfort, particularly during heatwaves. When planned alongside drainage and public realm improvements, these interventions help create places that remain liveable in a warmer climate, reducing health risks for residents while supporting more comfortable, attractive environments for growth.
Beyond environmental outcomes, greener and cooler streets support walking, active travel and public health, while preventative investment increasingly makes financial sense. Much of what councils fund today is reactive, repairing damage after flooding or extreme weather. With insurance markets pricing climate risk into assets, reducing exposure to flooding and overheating can help protect the long-term value of a place.
EcoBIDs are not about councils stepping back. They depend on active and confident public sector leadership, with local authorities setting the direction and shaping how partners contribute to shared outcomes.
This points to the growing importance of specialist capability. Determining whether an EcoBID is the right mechanism, and where other forms of nature based or conventional infrastructure may be more effective, requires a detailed understanding of drainage systems, land use, ownership patterns and long-term management.
Councils increasingly need access to teams who can work across planning, infrastructure, finance and ecology to assess options holistically and solutions that are investable and deliverable.
Equity and trust play a key part in this. Climate adaptation can be disruptive, particularly where street space is reallocated or construction takes place in established neighbourhoods. Transparent governance, strong engagement and a clear line of sight between contributions and local benefit are essential if new delivery models are to endure.
EcoBIDs are not a silver bullet, and they will not be appropriate everywhere. But they represent one practical option within a wider toolkit, enabling locally-funded, accountable and place-specific investment in climate resilience through a model councils already understand.
What is now required is a clear shift in governance. Councils must treat climate resilience as everyday urban infrastructure, embedding it into how places are planned, funded and managed, drawing on specialist insight where needed to move from isolated projects to delivery at scale.
Stephen O'Malley is chief executive of Civic Engineers
