Rooftop gardens might save our wildlife. So why aren’t we making more?

Australian grasses and wildflowers are swaying in the wind. There is standing water and “fallen” logs. Stones lay scattered. But don’t be fooled – nothing here has come about by chance. This is a highly contrived garden atop a decades old, three-level building at Victoria University in Footscray.

It is a fantasy of nature, finished just in time for the institution’s new academic year that starts on Monday. In this era of climate change, species extinctions and rapidly increasing urban density, it is expected to shed more light on the benefits and possibilities of roof gardens.

Landscape designer Gary Simpson hopes student research on the roof will help pave the way for the introduction of more green roofs in Melbourne because, while this age-old concept has been gathering pace around the world over the past 40 or so years, it has yet to take a firm hold in Australia.

While a number of high-profile living roofs have been established in Melbourne over the past decade – including demonstration and research ones at the University of Melbourne’s Burnley campus – Simpson says the uptake is low compared to many other countries.