Planning for Countering Climate Change: Lessons from the Recent Plan of New York City — PlaNYC 2030

Despite a growth in the number of cities currently planning with an eye toward countering climate change and its effects, few actually promote a comprehensive planning approach aiming at countering climate change impacts. The aim of this paper is to assess and to gain insight from the emerging approach to planning that aims at countering climate change. This paper analyses and draws insight from the recent plan of New York City (NYC), PlaNYC 2030, through a thorough examination and analysis of the major components of the plan. This paper concludes that planning has a strong role to play in countering the impacts of climate change at the city level. Apparently, climate change and its resulting uncertainties challenge the concepts, procedures, and scope of conventional approaches to planning, and create a need to rethink and revise current planning methods. PlaNYC, an economic development and infrastructure-oriented plan, has deficient and inadequate adaptation measures. Therefore, it failed in its contribution to protect NYC and its communities in facing Hurricane Sandy in October 2012. Since the plan did not have adequate public participation, PlaNYC failed in understanding the urban-community vulnerability map of NYC and in addressing the critical needs of various communities in facing Sandy. Eventually, planners should take on a leadership role and assume more control in fighting climate change on the city level. Planning has the power to protect cities and save lives of people.     

Planning for Place and Plexus: Metropolitan Land Use and Transport

Problem: Human and natural systems will probably have to adapt to climate change impacts, but this cannot be planned for using the traditional approach based on predictions because of the subject's great complexity, its planning horizon more than 50 years away, and uncertainty about the future climate and how effectively CO₂ emissions will be reduced.

Purpose: This article proposes a more appropriate basis for planning climate change adaptation. Anticipatory governance is a flexible decision framework that uses a wide range of possible futures to prepare for change and to guide current decisions toward maximizing future alternatives or minimizing future threats. Rather than trying to tame or ignore uncertainty, this approach explores uncertainty and its implications for current and future decision making.

Methods: I review and summarize the literature on anticipatory governance and provide three case studies to demonstrate its application to climate change planning.

Results and conclusions: Denver Water, New York City, and the City of Phoenix are all using scenarios to anticipate the range of global climate changes that may impact their communities and to develop adaptation strategies to address these impacts. Each is developing a decision framework for implementing adaptation strategies incrementally based on climate monitoring. An incremental approach minimizes the resources that must be allocated to address these risks and has allowed these cities to plan in spite of the high uncertainty associated with climate change science and social change.

Takeaway for practice: The complexity, uncertainty, and distant planning horizon associated with climate change cannot be managed sufficiently for the traditional predict-and-plan approach to yield good decisions about the significant social and capital investments likely to be required for adaptation. To be successful, social institutions must embrace new methods that explore uncertainty and that provide strategic guidance for current and future decisions.

Research support: None.     

State and Municipal Climate Change Plans: The First Generation

Problem: Global warming has emerged as one of the new century's top planning challenges. But it is far from clear how state and local governments in the United States can best address climate change through planning.

Purpose: As of 2008, 29 states had prepared some sort of climate change plan, and more than 170 local governments had joined the Cities for Climate Protection (CCP) campaign that requires that a plan be developed. This article analyzes this first generation of climate change plans and seeks to assess the goals being set, the measures included or left out, issues surrounding implementation, and the basic strengths and weaknesses of state and local climate change planning to date.

Methods: I conducted this research by analyzing planning documents as well as interviewing state and local officials by telephone. I analyzed the plans of three types of governments: all states with planning documents on climate change; cities with populations of over 500,000 that are members of the CCP campaign; and selected smaller cities that are CCP members.

Results and conclusions: Most plans set emissions-reduction goals, establish emission inventories, green public sector operations, and recommend a range of other measures. Many recent plans have been developed through extensive stakeholder processes and present very detailed lists of recommendations with quantified emissions benefits. But emissions-reduction goals vary widely, many proposed actions are voluntary, few resources have been allocated, and implementation of most measures has not yet taken place. Most plans do not address adaptation to a changing climate. Officials see rapidly growing public awareness of the issue and general support for climate change planning, but reluctance to change personal behavior.

Takeaway for practice: Future climate change planning should (a) set goals that can adequately address the problem; (b) establish long-term planning frameworks in which progress toward these goals can be monitored on a regular basis and actions revised as needed; (c) include the full range of measures needed to reduce and adapt to climate change; (d) ensure implementation of recommended actions through commitment of resources, revised regulation, incentives for reducing emissions, and other means; and (e) develop strategies to deepen public awareness of the need for fundamental changes in behavior, for example regarding motor vehicle use.

Research support: This research was supported by the University of California, Davis Department of Environmental Design.     

Adaptation to Climate Change

Problem: Even if significant reductions in global greenhouse gas emissions are achieved, some amount of climate change appears to be inevitable. Local, regional, state, and federal planning and regulation should begin to address how to adapt to these changes.

Purpose: This article presents a policy synthesis of adaptation planning issues, using California as a case study. We examine the institutional and regulatory challenges and tradeoffs that climate change poses in six particularly vulnerable areas: water resources, electricity, coastal resources, air quality, public health, and ecosystem resources. We discuss obstacles to adaptation planning and successes overcoming these barriers, and suggest how planning can incorporate adaptation.

Methods: This article presents a policy synthesis of adaptation planning issues, drawing on our recent research on California's experience and related literature. We summarize the results of six studies that draw on quantitative and qualitative information gathered through surveys, interviews, and literature review.

Results and conclusions: Planners should use forward-looking climate data that include higher water and air temperatures, sea-level rise, and increased numbers of extreme events like heat waves, floods, and wildfires when making decisions about future development, infrastructure investments, open-space protection, and disaster preparedness. Climate change will exacerbate conflicts between goals for economic development, habitat protection, and public safety, requiring stronger interagency coordination and new laws and regulations.

Takeaway for practice: Local and regional planners can help society adapt to a changing climate by using the best available science, deciding on goals and early actions, locating relevant partners, identifying and eliminating regulatory barriers, and encouraging the introduction of new state mandates and guidelines.

Research support: Partial support for this research was provided by Pacific Gas and Electric, The Nature Conservancy, and Next 10.     

Guiding principles for infrastructure climate change risk and adaptation studies

As global climate mitigation actions increasingly appear to be unable to curb global emissions, there has been a corresponding increase in climate adaptation planning undertaken by governments and communities. Along with an increasing number of adaptation studies, there has been an increasing complexity of adaptation studies as practitioners attempt to plan the adaptation of whole communities, cities and in some cases nations. These studies are commonly underpinned by increasingly complex climate change vulnerability studies that also attempt to encompass concepts such as resilience and adaptive capacity. Owners and operators of infrastructure assets and networks also need to consider climate change. This need has been met by an increasing number of climate change risk and adaptation studies of major infrastructure. The approaches used for these assessments are commonly derived from assessments of whole communities and policy development studies, and apply terminology that is often inconsistent with established engineering asset management methods and approaches. As a result the uptake of these studies has been less than desirable in many cases. To this end, the work presented here proposes a set of principles for undertaking the assessment of climate changes impacts on assets and infrastructure.     

Expanding the Scope and Impact of Collaborative Planning

Problem: As planners grow increasingly confident that they have settled on the right concepts and methods to conduct stakeholder-based collaboration, they are not considering what can be achieved through other collaborative approaches.

Purpose: We aimed to explore how creating a network of place- and stakeholder-based collaboratives using communities of practice could strengthen individual collaboratives and achieve network synergies.

Methods: Using a case study approach, we draw out lessons for collaborative planning from our research on the U.S. Fire Learning Network (FLN), a collaborative initiative to restore ecosystems that depend on fire. We analyzed data from over 140 interviews, hundreds of documents including restoration plans, newsletters, meeting summaries, maps, and various other reports, and observations at more than a dozen regional and national meetings.

Results and conclusions: We conclude that the FLN nurtures expertise in ecological fire restoration and collaborative planning by linking multi-stakeholder collaboratives to regional communities of practice. Moreover, this linkage creates and sustains a network of collaboratives that amplify the potential for fundamental change in the culture and practice of fire management.

Takeaway for practice: A community of practice is an effective approach to collaboration in situations where the purpose is to expand expertise rather than to resolve conflict and reach consensus. Moreover, a community of practice can link stakeholder-based collaboratives to create a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Realizing this potential requires questioning the universality of some of the core principles of stakeholder-based collaborative planning and diversifying the collaborative planning toolkit.

Research support: This research was supported by the Northern Research Station of the U. S. Forest Service and The Nature Conservancy.     

Explaining Progress in Climate Adaptation Planning Across 156 U.S. Municipalities

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Cities are increasingly experiencing the effects of climate change and taking steps to adapt to current and future natural hazard risks. Research on these efforts has identified numerous barriers to climate adaptation planning, but has not yet systematically evaluated the relative importance of different constraints for a large number of diverse cities. We draw on responses from 156 U.S. cities that participated in a 2011 global survey on local adaptation planning, 60% of which are planning for climate change. We use logistic regression analysis to assess the significance of 13 indicators measuring political leadership, fiscal and administrative resources, ability to obtain and communicate climate information, and state policies in predicting the status of adaptation planning. In keeping with the literature, we find that greater local elected officials’ commitment, higher municipal expenditures per capita, and an awareness that the climate is already changing are associated with cities engaging in adaptation planning. The presence of state policies on climate adaptation is surprisingly not a statistically significant predictor, suggesting that current policies are not yet strong enough to increase local adaptation planning. However, the model's sampling bias toward larger and more environmentally progressive cities may mask the predictive power of state policies and other indicators.

Takeaway for practice: State governments have an opportunity to increase local political commitment by integrating requirements for climate-risk evaluations into existing funding streams and investment plans. Regional planning entities also can help overcome the lack of local fiscal capacity and political support by facilitating the exchange of information, pooling and channeling resources, and providing technical assistance to local planners.     

Advancing responses to climate change through improved interplay between planning theory and practice

ABSTRACT

Many planning agencies worldwide now see climate change response as unavoidable. This paper proposes that a central task for contemporary planning theory is to guide planning practice as it develops multi-dimensional responses. We examine three theoretical constructs: anticipatory governance, legitimacy and social-ecological resilience. We argue that each conceptualises challenges climate change presents to planning practice, while providing theoretically informed options for responses. Building on this, we utilize Friedmann’s [2008. “The Uses of Planning Theory: A Bibliographic Essay.” Journal of Planning Education and Research 28 (2): 247–257. doi:10.1177/0739456X08325220] tasks for planning theory as a framework to assess the utility of planning theories to guide climate change response through practice. Associated issues are discussed, including the influence of translatable planning theories and the value of importing knowledge from other disciplines. The paper concludes that more sophisticated interplay between planning theory and practice may improve planning responses to the climate change threat. The need for planning theory to translate its conceptual discoveries to the domain of practice is key.     

基于情景规划的国家公园气候变化 应对：美国经验及对中国的启示

应对气候变化已成为全球共识,国家公园和自然保护地既是应对气候变化的重要阵地,也是受气候变化影响的敏感区域,但中国目前的研究和实践均还较薄弱,亟须借鉴域外经验。系统梳理了美国国家公园体系中,气候变化对自然、文化和社区的影响,概述了美国国家公园管理局的气候变化应对行动,指出情景规划是重要的气候变化应对工具。总结了美国国家公园在气候变化中开展情景规划的流程,提炼其规划特征,并以魔鬼塔国家纪念区为案例,详析其情景规划实践过程。在此基础上,总结了中国国家公园及体制试点区可能面临的气候变化风险,对比了情景规划与传统规划的区别,明确目前推广条件的欠缺,指出应逐步推广情景规划,并从实现科研储备、奠定实践基础、建立规划体系三方面提出可能的路径,对中国开展国家公园和自然保护地应对气候变化的相关工作具有借鉴意义。     

Whole Community Resilience: An Asset-Based Approach to Enhancing Adaptive Capacity Before a Disruption

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Conventional hazard mitigation and pre-disaster recovery planning processes typically begin with hazard scenarios that illustrate probable events and analyze their impacts on the built environment. The processes conclude with responses to the hypothetical disruption that focus on “hardening” buildings or structures or removing them from threatened areas. These approaches understate the importance of natural and social sources of adaptive capacity. Three “proof-of-principle” exercises designed to strengthen the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)'s Risk MAP (Risk Mapping, Assessment, and Planning) process in Washington State suggest how better to conduct hazard mitigation and recovery planning. Each begins with workshops where stakeholders identify built, natural, and social assets that contribute to human wellbeing (HWB) before introducing earthquake scenarios that affect HWB. Participants then identify assets that could facilitate adaptation to changed circumstances (a “new normal”). Participants discuss how these assets would achieve the goals of comprehensive community planning as well as hazard mitigation and recovery from disaster. Neighborhood-scale social organization emerges as an important priority.

Takeaway for practice: Asset-based approaches enable communities to better recover from disaster and adapt to a post-disaster “new normal.” By premising planning discussions on a more holistic set of assets, communities can balance physical recovery goals with qualities that help them to adapt to future change. Furthermore, thinking about recovering before an event actually occurs can enlarge the menu of mitigation strategies. Planning for adaptation can also help communities achieve many non-risk-related objectives.     

Institute Affairs

Problem, research strategy, and findings: We examine the post-plan impacts of the Sacramento region's 2004 Blueprint, a widely celebrated regional process, to better understand the impact of regional planning on local development patterns. We assess whether residential development after the plan was adopted (2004-2011) occurred in neighborhoods that better met Blueprint principles. We also assess whether the locations of post-plan residential development better met the priorities of Blueprint than pre-plan development (2001-2003), comparing these results by jurisdictions. The focus on residential developments limits our assessment; our use of census tract data as a proxy for neighborhood may also be problematic. We find that neighborhoods that best met Blueprint principles did not receive most new residential development. Moreover, highly rated neighborhoods received less residential development after the regional plan was adopted than before. However, some residential development did locate in neighborhoods that better met some plan principles: transportation choice, housing choice and diversity, and use of existing assets. In addition, development in some jurisdictions did follow Blueprint more than others. We conclude that some principles are easier to implement in some regions and in some local jurisdictions because of place-specific needs or the parochial interests of local jurisdictions.

Takeaway for practice: Planners should continually promote and advocate for regional principles while encouraging plan adoption at the local level by giving priority to principles with the most local support or support in specific jurisdictions as they negotiate interests in conflict. Planners should evaluate plan impacts to improve their own effectiveness regionally and to improve regional planning processes in general.     

Production,consumption, and protection: perspectives from North America on the multifunctional transition in rural planning

ABSTRACT

Rural areas encompass landscapes that range from peri-urban to very isolated ‘deep rural’ areas; from rapidly growing high amenity retirement and second home communities to dilapidated near-ghost towns; from those with strong economies in agriculture, natural resource extraction, tourism, and high tech to those with shrinking economies. In addition, such global issues as climate change, food security, and future energy supply have enormous implications for rural places. In these circumstances planning thought and action are confronted – often simultaneously – with physical development – planning for growth and change; production – of traditional agricultural and natural resource outputs but also new outputs such as renewable energy and ecosystem services; and protection – of the natural environment, cultural resources, and social systems. This article draws from the literature and interviews of rural specialists to explore the current tensions between production, consumption, and protection and emerging responses to them, through an exploration of North American rural planning.     

The Intersection of Planning,Urban Agriculture,and Food Justice: A Review of the Literature

Problem, research strategy, and findings: We draw on a multidisciplinary body of research to consider how planning for urban agriculture can foster food justice by benefitting socioeconomically disadvantaged residents. The potential social benefits of urban agriculture include increased access to food, positive health impacts, skill building, community development, and connections to broader social change efforts. The literature suggests, however, caution in automatically conflating urban agriculture’s social benefits with the goals of food justice. Urban agriculture may reinforce and deepen societal inequities by benefitting better resourced organizations and the propertied class and contributing to the displacement of lower-income households. The precariousness of land access for urban agriculture is another limitation, particularly for disadvantaged communities. Planners have recently begun to pay increased attention to urban agriculture but should more explicitly support the goals of food justice in their urban agriculture policies and programs.

Takeaway for practice: We suggest several key strategies for planners to more explicitly orient their urban agriculture efforts to support food justice, including prioritizing urban agriculture in long-term planning efforts, developing mutually respectful relationships with food justice organizations and urban agriculture participants from diverse backgrounds, targeting city investments in urban agriculture to benefit historically disadvantaged communities, increasing the amount of land permanently available for urban agriculture, and confronting the threats of gentrification and displacement from urban agriculture. We demonstrate how the city of Seattle (WA) used an equity lens in all of its programs to shift its urban agriculture planning to more explicitly foster food justice, providing clear examples for other cities.     

Whiteness and Urban Planning

Abstract

Problem, research strategy, and findings: The ability of planning to address America’s urban problems of inequality, crime, housing, education, and segregation is hampered by a relative neglect of Whiteness and its role in shaping urban outcomes. We offer a justification for centering Whiteness within urban planning scholarship and practice that would examine its role shaping and perpetuating regional and racial injustices in the American city. The focus of planners, scholars, and public discourse on the “dysfunctions” of communities of color, notably poverty, high levels of segregation, and isolation, diverts attention from the structural systems that produce and reproduce the advantages of affluent and White neighborhoods. Planners and planning scholars frequently invoke a “legacy of injustice” with regard to concentrated poverty and disadvantage but not in regard to neighborhoods of White affluence. One is segregated and problematized and the other is idealized.

Takeaway for practice: Planners and planning scholars need to understand the role of Whiteness, in particular White affluence, to assess the potential impacts of planning interventions. Doing so will inform a wider range of planning approaches to problems of racial and spatial equity.     

Planning Consultants and Local Planning

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Planning consultants are a vital part of the local government planning process. We explore who hires consultants, the types of tasks that they typically perform, and differences in the values of planning consultants and their clients. We conduct parallel surveys of planning consultants and local government officials, and find that the use of consultants is widespread: They are hired primarily to reduce the costs of maintaining in-house planning staff and to provide as-needed technical expertise. Both planning officials and consultants agree on the priority given to well–accepted planning principles, even though each group thinks they hold planning principles in higher esteem than the other. Yet, we find that the actual differences between the self-professed values of the two groups are negligible.

Takeaway for practice: This study suggests that both consultants and their clients believe that the advantages of hiring consultants, including supplementing in-house staff, providing workforce flexibility, and offering technical expertise, outweigh the disadvantages of possibly higher costs and lack of local knowledge. The study provides reasons for optimism that outsourcing planning work does not change the underlying planning values of the agencies employing the consultants, or the goals and objectives of the planning work.

Research support: Wayne State University College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.     

State of the Art in Planning for College and University Campuses: Site Planning and Beyond

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Colleges and universities have been planning their campuses for centuries, yet scholars have conducted little empirical research regarding the nature of campus planning in the United States. We review recent scholarship on campus planning, discovering that it is dominated by case studies (sometimes in edited collections) and some comparative studies. In this review we organize the literature into 3 geographic scales: the campus per se (or campus park), the campus–­community interface, and the larger campus district. The literature addresses 5 topics: land use, design, sustainability, economic development, and collaboration. Most of the studies focus on research-oriented universities in metropolitan locations. The literature emphasizes how campus master planning can support student learning, how design and building guidelines can make a campus more cohesive, and how campuses are adopting sustainable development and operations. At the campus–­community interface, the research documents how some colleges and universities have expanded beyond their traditional boundaries, invested in local economic development, and worked with their communities to improve transportation and reduce environmental impacts. Studies of campus district planning emphasize community adoption of development regulations and code enforcement procedures to reduce the impact of students living in nearby neighborhoods. The literature stresses the importance of partnerships, collaboration, and enhanced communications between the university and the community.

Takeaway for practice: University planners should continue to focus on site design that reinforces student learning and environmental sustainability and on community interface planning that supports economic development and reduces environmental impacts. City planners should expand campus district planning to address a broad array of issues and opportunities. Both university and city planners should facilitate collaboration between their institutions. Scholars should study a wide range of colleges and universities, including 2-year as well as 4-year institutions and those in nonurban settings.     

德国景观规划应对气候变化策略

气候变化导致生态系统、城市生产生活发生巨大变化，给人类的生存和活动带来了负面影响，而合理的景观规划可以减缓气候变化，使人居环境更好地适应气候变化及其影响。通过文献梳理，剖析气候变化对景观规划提出的新要求，梳理德国景观规划针对气候变化的因应策略。德国景观规划在面对气候变化的不确定性、直接与间接影响时坚持生态优先，通过情景假设、监测更新等机制灵活应对气候变化，及时调整规划内容，综合考虑气候变化的各方面影响，确定应对措施。德国景观规划编制、调整、实施等方面经验对气候变化背景下中国景观规划的良性发展具有一定指导意义。     

Planning appeals: The impacts of conflicting planning philosophies between judicial and executive planning bodies ‐ a rural planning case study

Abstract

All Australian planning systems include a right of appeal to allow decisions to be reviewed, and the appeal body is usually a court or tribunal. The legal interpretation of planning principles therefore has the capacity to significantly influence planning practice. This article explores the potential for conflicting philosophies between judicial and executive planning bodies and examines the impacts these differences may have on planning practice, policy and outcomes.     

Planning for Unplanned Pork

Problem, research strategy, and findings: To understand how communities use zoning ordinances to achieve sustainability goals, we identify nine sustainability principles and 53 associated regulatory items that might be included in a zoning ordinance to achieve sustainable development and then examine the zoning ordinances of 32 randomly selected communities to determine if they included these principles and their associated items. We find both wide variation and some consistency in how zoning ordinances address sustainability goals, independent of city size or location in the country. Some of the identified principles and regulatory items are found in many ordinances; others appear in only a few. However, there is an inverse relationship between the age of the ordinance and the extent to which it includes sustainability principles. As ordinances are updated, it is likely that they will address more topical sustainability concerns. We study only ordinance content, not implementation; moreover, sustainability can be achieved in ways other than zoning. However, zoning ordinances that directly address sustainability in many dimensions are more likely to achieve these goals. We conclude that planners can more effectively use zoning ordinances to achieve sustainable development.

Takeaway for practice: This review of zoning ordinances can alert local planners to the many ways in which zoning ordinances could be used to achieve sustainability goals and suggest how planners can assess the contribution of their zoning ordinance to the sustainable development of their communities.     

The Migrant Metropolis and American Planning

Problem: Immigration poses various problems for U.S. cities and regions, and the roles planners should play in migrant communities are not clear.

Purpose: I consider how practitioners and scholars have understood and addressed the planning challenges and opportunities presented by the major migrations of ethnic minorities to U.S. cities and regions over the past century.

Methods: I trace discussions of planning and migration at professional planning conferences over the past century and survey planning scholarship and practice related to immigration and migrant communities in three principal eras: early 20th century southern and eastern European immigration; the mid-century internal migrations of African Americans and Puerto Ricans; and immigration in the late 20th and early 21st century.

Results and conclusions: Over the past century, immigration has had physical, economic, and social effects on people and places that are legitimate concerns of urban planners. Yet, the planning profession has had an ambiguous and often ambivalent relationship with migrant communities and has struggled to define specific roles for planners within those communities while social workers and other community and economic development practitioners played larger roles. Planning scholars have not paid as much attention to migrants' adaptation and mobility in U.S. society or their impacts on receiving communities, labor markets, housing, and congestion as have other scholars and urbanists.

Takeaway for practice: Planners have engaged with migrants in a variety of ways. Understanding this history provides context for contemporary debates about immigration and helps frame challenges and opportunities in migrant and receiving communities as planning problems.

Research support: None.