Building Resilience and Planning for Extreme Water-Related Events

Teresa Sprague, Kathrin Prenger-Berninghoff

• Publisher: Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9783319997438
• eBook ISBN: 9783319997445
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Environmental Science
• Index: Biological Sciences

This book discusses what it means for cities to work toward and achieve resilience in the face of climate change. The content takes an urban planning perspective with a water-related focus, exploring the continued global and local efforts in improving disaster risk management within the water sphere. Chapters examine four cities in the US and Germany - San Francisco, San Diego, Solingen and Wuppertal - as the core case studies of the discussion. The chapters for each case delve into the current status of the cities and issues resilience must overcome, and then explore solutions and key takeaways learned from the implementation of various resilience approaches. The book concludes with a summary of cross-cutting themes, best-practice examples and a reflection on the relevance of the approaches to cases in the wider developing world.
This book engages both practitioners and scientific audiences alike, particularly those interested in issues addressed bythe Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the recent Water Action Decade 2018-2028 and the Rockefeller Foundation's 100 Resilient Cities.

© The Author(s) 2019

Teresa Sprague and Kathrin Prenger-BerninghoffBuilding Resilience and Planning for Extreme Water-Related EventsPalgrave Studies in Climate Resilient Societieshttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-99744-5_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

Teresa Sprague¹ and Kathrin Prenger-Berninghoff²

(1)

Woodard & Curran Inc., San Francisco, CA, USA

(2)

Institute of Urban and Transport Planning, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

Teresa Sprague

Email: [email protected]

Abstract

The introduction provides the readers with a useful overview of the global dialogue on resilience for water-related extremes as it pertains to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities as key frameworks and global initiatives. The chapter as a teaching tool helps readers grasp the relevant components of these frameworks for the building resilience for these extremes highlighting and summarizing essential sections of the frameworks and how these contribute to the high-level dialogue that can be considered as a backdrop for reading into specific in-practice case examples. The contents also provide the book chapter structures and a short list of key terms.

Keywords

Urban resilienceWater-related extremesSendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development100 Resilient Cities

End Abstract

1.1 Introduction to and Purpose of the Work

There are many literature reviews and scholarly articles written about definitions of resilience originating in and expanding from various fields of ecology. In the current state of science, the relevant fields span a wide, interdisciplinary audience. For examples of useful literature reviews on the state of science for resilience, readers are encouraged to review the following: the seminal work in the field of ecology by Holling (1973); Walker, Holling, Carpenter, and Kinzig (2004); Berkes, Folke, and Colding (2000); review from Martin-Breen and Anderies (2011); Folke (2006); and Godschalk (2003). For the purpose of this book, this introduction addresses why the authors are investigating the need to build urban resilience from a practical sense and develops an understanding of the global dialogue for contextual reference. The authors recognize the timeliness of the topic at hand, both within developments internationally of understanding and applying resilience to combat ever increasing potential impacts of climatic change, and within the authors’ personal and past research experience in the fields of both climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction. The work and examples within this book contribute to the understanding and practical application of how cities build resilience to the impacts of water-related extremes, what this looks like, and what is meant by being climate resilient within an urban environment.

A total of four case cities are presented in this book, with two from the United States and two from Germany. These are comprised of the cities of San Francisco and San Diego in the United States and the cities of Solingen and Wuppertal in Germany. The US cases are both found within the State of California and represent major cities within the United States that rely on one of the most complex water systems in the country, representing both extreme and unique case selection. The German cases were selected based on their representativeness of increasingly recurring extreme events and related problems within Germany and the European Union (i.e. impacts of urban flooding and storms), as well as the cities’ interest and willingness to participate in climate change adaptation-based projects.

All of these cases are governed by federal administrative systems and deal with extreme events and issues related to heavy precipitation, particularly flooding and storms. This allows for some degree of comparability in terms of resilience efforts to combat urban flooding and the ability to address consequential water quality issues. However, the pairings also make for a contrast of different types of planning systems as well as different microclimates that provide different ranges of other extreme events and topographical challenges. For instance, the two US cases are coastal, adding to their resilience efforts the need to address sea level rise and coastal storm surge (including impacts of coastal flooding). The US cases also deal with extreme deficit of water resources, particularly drought and therefore also maintain a focus on water resource planning (e.g. supply reliability and demand management) in addition to general disaster risk reduction. The City of San Francisco is also a current city selected within the network of the 100 Resilient Cities initiative and consequently has a longer chapter in this book in order to cover the more advanced and recent progress that has been achieved with 100 Resilient City funding and the development of a specific city resiliency strategy. The two German cases provide depth into a common national research project called “BESTKLIMA” focused on flood risk, allowing more specific insights into examples of resilient technology implemented at the local level. All of the cases, however, help provide practical examples of how cities are managing impacts of extreme water-related events within urban settings and working to overcome this by building urban resilience . The topic is timely within the cases as several are only recently embarking on resilience efforts at a city level or have this as a component within another planning framework. The examples also contribute to a currently evolving global dialogue on resilience frameworks pushed forward by the bodies of the United Nations and the work of the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities initiative. The sections of this introduction chapter provide the reader with an overview of this global dialogue as well as a brief description of the book’s chapter sections and a key terminology shortlist.

Before reading into the next section, it is also important to address what is meant by “extreme” and what constitutes an “extreme climate event”. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report on Extreme Events, a “climate extreme” is defined as “[t]he occurrence of a value of a weather or climate variable above (or below) a threshold value near the upper (or lower) ends of the range of observed values of the variable” (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2012a, p. 3). Extremes can include events, such as drought and flooding (including flash flooding), that represent the higher ranges in available water through either extreme surplus or deficit in comparison to typical water availability values. Other water-related extremes are related to the destructive occurrence of storms, including storm surge , and sea level rise especially for coastal communities. All of these extremes can vary in intensity and frequency and are often measured by the rarity of their occurrence. For example, an extreme climate event can also be defined as an event that rarely occurs within historic record such as a “100-year event” which has the likelihood to occur once every 100 years, and therefore has a one percent likelihood of occurring in any given year (Pierce, 2012). A change in the frequency of the event, particularly with respect to climate change, may equate to a higher recurrence of events that previously had a much lower likelihood of occurring in any given year. For example, this may mean the 100-year events may become more of a norm, occurring with a greater likelihood, and potentially taking place on a more regular basis multiple times a year. The intensity of an event often refers to the degree of difference from a normal event where, for example, a heatwave with greater intensity than previous heatwaves will have a higher temperature or may have a higher temperature than any heatwave previously recorded (Pierce, 2012). The same goes for flooding, a more intense flood will typically have a greater volume of water and can have a higher destructive potential.

1.2 The State of Global Dialogue on Resilience for Water-Related Extremes

The global dialogue on resilience within the management of urban water-related extremes can be observed through key agendas, frameworks, and initiatives including the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (the SDGs), the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030, the Water Action Decade 2018–2028, and the work of the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities . The collection of these global efforts provides insight into different elements of resilience and how this is understood at a high level. These insights present a backdrop that can be used to recognize common themes that are addressed in more local resilience building efforts found within the in-practice case examples in this book.

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, known also as the Sustainable Development Goals or SDGs, contains several articles and goals that directly address resilience. The first appearance is within Article 7 in which the SDGs stress a need for “[a] world where human habitats are safe, resilient and sustainable…” (United Nations, 2015, p. 7). According to Article 9, this should be a world in which both general development as well as how technology is used is done in a manner that respects biodiversity, is climate-sensitive , and is also resilient. Several of the SDG goals have direct relevance for resilience in the water sector and for water-related extremes. These are summarized in Table 1.1.

Table 1.1

Summary of relevant Sustainable Development Goals and applicability in addressing resilience for water-related extremes (Aut...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Introduction to California Cases
• 3. Case: San Diego, California, USA
• 4. Case: San Francisco, California, USA
• 5. Introduction to German Cases
• 6. Case: Solingen, North-Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
• 7. Case: Wuppertal, North-Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
• 8. Conclusion and Cross-Cutting Themes
• Back Matter