Resilient communities build on local strengths to anticipate change, reduce the impact of major events, and come back from a blow stronger than ever. Here are seven ideas from cities and towns working to boost local resilience.
Our communities are constantly changing. Most changes are gradual and predictable—a new store opens on Main Street, newcomers come to town and priorities shift. But, sometimes change is abrupt, unexpected—a major natural disaster or an epidemic.
How can your city or town best prepare for unanticipated change? What will help your community respond to challenges not only to bounce back, but to become stronger than ever?
CommunityMatters offers seven ideas from cities and towns working to boost local resilience. Ideas range from simple, grassroots efforts like community gardens to more complex actions, including the creation of a local resilience task force.
FULL STORY: 7 Ways to Boost Your Community’s Resilience
Norfolk Plans for Resilience in the Face of Climate Change
The Ohio Creek Watershed Project aims to protect the city's coastline and prepare for future sea level rise.
Resilient Los Angeles: Preparing for Overlapping Disasters in Pandemic
L.A. City Chief Resilience Officer Aaron Gross elaborates on how the pandemic is shaping the city’s understanding of resilience and the cascading impact that overlapping disasters of earthquake or wildfire could have on the city’s limited resources.
More Detail on What Happened to 100 Resilient Cities
The Rockefeller Foundation has cited costs and a new strategic direction to explain why it abruptly cut off the program this year. While the work may live on in some form, the move underscores the risks of relying on private funding.
The state-sanctioned urbicide of Austin
People don’t kill cities. Freeways do.
US to reduce Colorado River water deliveries to Mexico
A new Colorado Treaty amendment reduces Mexico’s Colorado River water allocation by 250,000 acre feet.
New Jersey’s second-largest city bans standalone data centers
Jersey City will continue to allow co-location facilities, such as those meant for research institutions that store their own data.
Amtrak not solely to blame for New Jersey commuter rail's unreliability, report finds
A new study from the Garden State Initiative found that NJ Transit’s budget grew 20% across a 4 year period, but reliability declined significantly over the same period.
EPA erases limits on planet-warming pollution from power plants
Under Monday’s plan, power plants would still have some limits on how much mercury, arsenic and other contaminants they can emit.
Phoenix announces new on-demand transit service, more frequent RAPID buses
Both new services will launch in October, and are part of Phoenix's Project Effective Access Solutions for Easing Congestion.
FREE Course: Walkable City 1: Why Walkability?
After describing his path towards focusing on walkability as the essence of good planning, Jeff Speck marches through his five principal reasons for making more walkable places.
Reinventing Malls: Planning Alchemy—Turning Gray Fields Into Gold
The course focuses on the opportunities and imperatives that shape reinvention of mall sites.
Eagle County Government
Harvard University Graduate School of Design
Nashville Planning Department
The Architects Foundation
University of Cincinnati Online
The Pocatello Development Authority
The Urban Renewal Agency of the City of Pocatello
Journal of the American Planning Association