Outside Experience #3: NPR Visits SPEA

OnThursday, November 13th, NPR Cities Project did a broadcast from the SPEA atrium.  I would have attended this event no matter what, but their topic was only too appropriate for our Sustainable Communities course.The discussion revolved around Urban Life in the 21st Century and the idea of designing for "resiliency." 

They started the discussion with some quick info: that 80% of the U.S. population lives in an urban area; that the 21st century is expected to be the "Urban Century"; and the question, is resilience the new sustainability?  

Resilience, per the speakers, is the idea of adapting to climate change rather than mitigating climate change. Accordingly, the top 3 important considerations for resiliency are location, design, and mobility:

• Location - is a community in a flood prone area? a fire prone area? a coastline that's eroding?
• Design - includes engineering, science, visual, and structural considerations
• Mobility - transportation considerations - making multi-modal cities, including alternate pathways and redundancies

A few cities were highlighted: 

• Staten Island - they are tearing down some homes to let nature return & provide a buffer
• Yemen & Phoenix - implementing a light rail, tall buildings and narrow streets to take advantage of shade, & decrease the heat island effects

 This event really made me sit and think about the idea of adapting versus mitigating climate change. It also made me think of some environmental justice issues. 

For starters, while I like the idea of resiliency, I cannot support only adapting to climate change. I think it needs to be used in addition to aggressive climate change mitigation measures. To simply make plans to adapt is risky. However, I also recognize the fact that at this point, we are likely too late on addressing climate change to simply mitigate. We need a robust discussion about both adaptation measures and mitigation measures. We need to implement policies aimed at decreasing CO2 emissions and other GHG emissions, such as methane. Also, we need to look at areas where people maybe should not be inhabitants. Maybe it is better for some coastlines to be buffers. Maybe there is a way to encourage these buffers and also use them to some degree for hiking or exploring or nature classes. Perhaps there are means to directly & economically benefit from those areas returning to nature. Finally, I think adapting our urban centers and implementing systems to make them more resilient is also a necessary part of the puzzle. We need mass transit options that are extensive and reliable in all major cities to discourage the use of individual cars. We need safe bike lane infrastructure to encourage travel by bike in cities. We need more trees and better buildings to make the most of city living while respecting nature. Essentially, I want the best of both worlds. I want the US and individual states to take all of these actions!

As for the issue of environmental justice...the main speaker was discussing these issues with the perspective of having dealt with Hurricane Sandy.  And, that's great. But where was this conversation 9 years ago when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans? Well, I think part of the answer is that (some) New Yorkers are wealthier and have a voice to bring these issues to light. They will demand these issues be addressed and their government will respond. Unfortunately, I do not think that's the case in New Orleans. Thus, they did not see this sort of rebound and response after Hurricane Katrina. If I'm not mistaken, there are still negative effects lingering in certain areas of New Orleans.  

I think this NPR discussion is great for SPEA. Hopefully it sparked these same sort of thoughts in many of the audience members.