Beyond the Guidebook Initiative

Road Map for Moving from Awareness to Action
Released in June 2010, Beyond the Guidebook 2010: Implementing a New Culture for Urban Watershed Protection and Restoration in British Columbia draws on BC case study experience to illustrate how success will follow when local government elected representatives, administrators and practitioners:
  1. Choose to be enabled.
  2. Establish high expectations.
  3. Embrace a shared vision.
  4. Collaborate as a ‘regional team’.
  5. Align and integrate efforts.
  6. Celebrate innovation.
  7. Connect with community advocates.
  8. Develop local government talent.
  9. Promote shared responsibility.
  10. Change the land ethic for the better.

Integrate the Site with the Watershed and the Stream: Launched in 2007, the "Beyond the Guidebook initiative" is about restoring and protecting watershed function over time. The desired outcome of a landscape-based and action-oriented process is a Watershed Blueprint:
  • Agree on the vision. 
  • Set the targets. 
  • Provide planners with the detail necessary to guide site level decisions as opportunities arise. 
  • Then implement.
The Partnership for Water Sustainability is leading the Beyond the Guidebook initiative. The initiative is facilitating a common understanding and consistent messaging through an information-sharing and educational program that aligns efforts across boundaries, both jurisdictional and geographic.

TO LEARN MORE: The technical foundation for the Beyond the Guidebook initiative is provided by Stormwater Planning: A Guidebook for British Columbia, released in 2002. Looking back, the Guidebook was a catalyst for change that has resulted in British Columbia achieving international recognition as a leader in implementing a green infrastructure approach to rainwater management. 

Beyond the Guidebook 2010 connects the dots between RAINwater Management and Drought Management and shows how to achieve water sustainability through outcome-oriented urban watershed plans. To access the Beyond the Guidebook 2010 homepage on the WaterBucket website, click here.
 December 2011