Advancing climate change poses major new challenges, particularly for cities and urban centres. Heat stress and heavy rainfall events are already causing damage to technical infrastructure, inner-city vegetation or reducing the quality of life on sealed surfaces. Ground cover maps show the heat load due to the high proportion of sealed surfaces. The city of Lucerne is also affected by this. To counteract this, the city's urban gardening and urban drainage / natural hazards departments want to promote climate-adapted urban development.

Multifunctional building blocks can be used to promote a sustainable, resilient and water-sensitive city according to the ‘sponge city principle’. Specific measures for Lucerne's sponge city principle are to be developed in a pilot project. These measures will then be incorporated into various infrastructure projects in the city of Lucerne and provide support for planning, implementation and management.

The ZHAW Wädenswil plant use research group and the OST Institute for Environmental and Process Engineering (UMTEC) have been commissioned to take on accompanying tasks in the development of basic principles, planning, realisation and evaluation of pilot projects. The Lucerne municipal nursery will be supported by these institutions in various issues, such as the development of suitable substrates, suitable vegetation concepts, plant selection, trial design, practical implementation, success monitoring and knowledge transfer.