Ask ten people what a "sponge city" is and you will get ten different answers. Silvia Oppliger knows this better than most, because asking that question is how she opens almost every conversation she has. It is a good word for catching attention, she says, and a really spongy one for everything after that.

Silvia is an environmental engineer and the coordinator of the Swiss Water Association's National Sponge City Network. Over three years she has pulled federal offices, cantons, municipalities, universities, engineering and architecture associations, spatial planners, landscape architects and even the insurance sector into the same rooms. More than 800 experts across exchange events, six webinars, 80 presentations, a national information platform and a professional certification course.

We get into the parts that rarely make the conference slides. Why Article 7 of the Swiss Water Protection Act arrives too late in a project to change much. Why 26 cantons means 26 water regulations, and what happened when a working group tried to agree on one table. Why some cantonal street laws make it questionable to send rainwater from your own garden onto the road. Why the municipalities moving fastest are not the big cities.

Silvia also tells the story underneath the job. Three mother tongues before she started school. A suit bought at 27 out of nerves, and a room with 70 men in it. And the idea she keeps returning to now, which is that water professionals have to learn "architect" as a language if they want to be heard at all.

Her definition of innovation is worth the listen on its own. Ninety-five per cent of it, she argues, is not technology.

Chapters:
0:00 Intro
1:59 Guest Intro & The Polyglot
8:19 An environmental engineer who connects people
13:54 Regulations and unifying 26 Cantons in Switzerland
15:50 The road to National Sponge Cities Coordinator
21:03 Terminology Discussion and Swiss Sponge City History
26:05 The Swiss Sponge Cities Network
33:46 Swiss Public and Private Water Management
37:16 National differences in priorities and silos
45:38 Communication and Knowledge Exchange Strategies
50:57 Reflecting on the outputs of the first three years
1:00:32 Where the Sponge Cities Network is heading
1:06:35 Silvia's Future Plans
1:07:42 Q&A Start
1:08:05 What does innovation mean to you?
1:09:12 Key moment, event, person
1:12:31 Time Management
1:15:59 Favourite childhood memory
1:17:10 Biggest challenge to date
1:20:42 Advice for young professionals
1:22:27 What would you most like to be remembered for?
1:23:24 Where can people find you?
1:24:13 Final Message
1:24:37 Outro

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