Adaptation Urbanism and Resilient Communities : Transforming Streets to Address Climate Change

Adaptation Urbanism and Resilient Communities outlines and explains adaptation urbanism as a theoretical framework for understanding and evaluating resilience projects in cities and relates it to pressing contemporary policy issues related to urban climate change mitigation and adaptation.

Through a series of detailed case studies, this book uncovers the promise and tensions of a new wave of resilient communities in Europe (Copenhagen, Rotterdam, and London), and the United States (New Orleans and South Florida). In addition, best practice projects in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Delft, Utrecht, and Vancouver are examined. The authors highlight how these communities are reinventing the role of streets and connecting public spaces in adapting to and mitigating climate change through green/blue infrastructure planning, maintaining and enhancing sustainable transportation options, and struggling to ensure equitable development for all residents. The case studies demonstrate that while there are some more universal aspects to encouraging adaptation urbanism, there are also important local characteristics that need to be both acknowledged and celebrated to help local communities thrive in the era of climate change. The book also provides key policy lessons and a roadmap for future research in adaptation urbanism.

Advancing resilience policy discourse through multidisciplinary framework this work will be of great interest to students of urban planning, geography, transportation, landscape architecture, and environmental studies, as well as resilience practitioners around the world.

Billy Fields is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Texas State University. His research focuses on understanding the key elements of resilient communities. He is the co-editor of Transport Beyond Oil (2013) and leads the International Sustainable Transportation Engagement Program, an annual study abroad program in the Netherlands exploring best practices in active transportation.

John L. Renne is Professor and Director of the Center for Urban and Environmental Solutions (CUES) in the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at Florida Atlantic University.