Introduction. Click here to buy this book in print or download it as a free PDF, if available. Efforts to reduce severe urban disparities in public health, economic prosperity, and citizen engagement allow cities to improve their full potential and become more appealing and inclusive places to live and work (UN, 2016b). Each city's challenges are unique; however, many have implemented one or more of the following in their efforts to develop their own integrated solutions: This task is complex and requires further methodological developments making use of harmonized data, which may correlate material and energy consumption with their socioeconomic drivers, as attempted by Niza et al. Urban areas and the activities within them use resources and produce byproducts such as waste and pollution that drive many types of global change, such as resource depletion, land-use change, loss of biodiversity, and high levels of energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. ir quality and water resources can be protected through proper quality management and government policy. How can regional planning efforts respond tourban sustainability challenges? Environmental disasters are more likely to occur with greater intensity; buildings, streets, and facilities are more likely to be damaged or destroyed. This common approach can be illustrated in the case of urban food scraps collection where many cities first provided in-kind support to individuals and community groups offering collection infrastructure and services, then rolled out programs to support social norming in communities (e.g., physical, visible, green bins for residents to be put out at the curb), and finally banned organics from landfills, providing a regulatory mechanism to require laggards to act. What are six challenges to urban sustainability? A set of standards that are required of water in order for its quality to be considered high. 3 Clark, C. M. 2015. However, many of these areas may be contaminated and polluted with former toxins and the costs of clean-up and redevelopment may be high. Have all your study materials in one place. In practice cities could, for example, quantify their sustainability impacts using a number of measures such as per capita ecological footprint and, making use of economies of scale, make efforts to reduce it below global levels of sustainability. The use of a DPSIR model posits an explicit causality effect between different actors and consequences and ensures exhaustive coverage of the phenomena contained in the model (Ferro and Fernandez, 2013). This could inadvertently decrease the quality of life for residents in cities by creating unsanitary conditions which can lead to illness, harm, or death. . For instance, with warmer recorded temperatures, glaciers melt faster. For the APHG Exam, remember these six main challenges! (2015), and Rosado et al. For instance, industrial pollution, which can threaten air and water quality, must be mitigated. How can suburban sprawl be a challenge to urban sustainability? For a renewable resourcesoil, water, forest, fishthe sustainable rate of use can be no greater than the rate of regeneration of its source. (2014). (2009), NRC (2004), Pina et al. These same patterns of inequality also exist between regions and states with poor but resource-rich areas bearing the cost of the resource curse (see also Box 3-3). A Review of Policy Responses on Urban Mobility" Sustainability 13, no. Fig. 5. Developing new signals of urban performance is a crucial step to help cities maintain Earths natural capital in the long term (Alberti, 1996). Climate change overall threatens cities and their built infrastructure. It is crucial for city leaders to be aware of such perceptions, both true and artificial, and the many opportunities that may arise in directly addressing public concerns, as well as the risks and consequences of not doing so. Inequitable environmental protection undermines procedural, geographic, and social equities (Anthony, 1990; Bullard, 1995). Cities have experienced an unprecedented rate of growth in the last decade. Set individual study goals and earn points reaching them. Urban sustainability is therefore a multiscale and multidimensional issue that not only centers on but transcends urban jurisdictions and which can only be addressed by durable leadership, citizen involvement, and regional partnerships as well as vertical interactions among different governmental levels. Urban sustainability is the goal of using resources to plan and develop cities to improve the social, economic, and environmental conditions of a city to ensure the quality of life of current and future residents. Everything you need for your studies in one place. In many ways, this is a tragedy of the commons issue, where individual cities act in their own self-interest at the peril of shared global resources. Principle 4: Cities are highly interconnected. What are the 5 indicators of water quality? Another approach is for government intervention through regulation of activities or the resource base. Durable sustainability policies that transcend single leaders, no matter how influential, will also be necessary to foster reliable governance and interconnectedness over the long term for cities. over time to produce the resources that the population consumes, and to assimilate the wastes that the population produces, wherever on Earth the relevant land and/or water is located. Create the most beautiful study materials using our templates. According to the definition by Gurr and King (1987), the first relates to vertical autonomy, which is a function of the citys relationship with senior-level government. Intended as a comparative illustration of the types of urban sustainability pathways and subsequent lessons learned existing in urban areas, this study examines specific examples that cut across geographies and scales and that feature a range of urban sustainability challenges and opportunities for collaborative learning across metropolitan regions. 2Abel Wolman (1965) developed the urban metabolism concept as a method of analyzing cities and communities through the quantification of inputswater, food, and fueland outputssewage, solid refuse, and air pollutantsand tracking their respective transformations and flows. In each parameter of sustainability, disruptions can only be withstood to a certain level without possible irreversible consequences. Jump up to the previous page or down to the next one. How can the redevelopment of brownfields respond tourban sustainability challenges? Sustainable development can be implemented in ways that can both mitigate the challenges of urban sustainability and address the goals. Bai (2007) points to threethe spatial, temporal, and institutional dimensionsand in each of these dimensions, three elements exist: scale of issues, scale of concerns, and scale of actions and responses. This is because without addressing these challenges, urban sustainability is not as effective. Examples of Urban Sustainability Challenges Making cities more resilient against these environmental threats is one of the biggest challenges faced by city authorities and requires urgent attention. One challenge in the case of cities, however, is that many of these shared resources do not have definable boundaries such as land. Furthermore, this studys findings cross-validate the findings of earlier work examining the recession-induced pollution reductions of the early 1980s. Climate, precipitation, soil and sediments, vegetation, and human activities are all factors of declining water quality. Third, the critical task of developing finance models to support urban sustainability action requires urgent attention. The six main challenges to urban sustainability include: suburban sprawl, sanitation, air and water quality, climate change, energy use, and the ecological footprint of cities. These goals generally include attracting new investment, improving social conditions (and reducing social problems), ensuring basic services and adequate housing, and (more recently) raising environmental standards within their jurisdiction. These tools should provide a set of indicators whose political relevance refers both to its usefulness for securing the fulfillment of the vision established for the urban system and for providing a basis for national and international comparisons, and the metrics and indicators should be policy relevant and actionable. What is the ideal pH for bodies of water? Urban Development Home. 3 Principles of Urban Sustainability: A Roadmap for Decision Making. 4, Example of a greenbelt in Tehran, Iran (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tochal_from_Modarres_Expressway.jpg), by Kaymar Adl (https://www.flickr.com/photos/kamshots/), licensed by CC-BY-2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en). Local decision making must have a larger scope than the confines of the city or region. In an era that is characterized by global flows of commodities, capital, information, and people, the resources to support urban areas extend the impacts of urban activities along environmental, economic, and social dimensions at national and international levels, and become truly global; crossing these boundaries is a prerequisite for sustainable governance. How does air pollution contribute to climate change? One is that the ecological footprint is dominated by energy as over 50 percent of the footprint of most high- and middle-income nations is due to the amount of land necessary to sequester greenhouse gases (GHGs). Resources Cities need resources such as water, food and energy to be viable. Poor resource management can not only affect residents in cities but also people living in other parts of the world. Part of the solution lies in how cities are planned, governed, and provide services to their citizens. Copyright 2023 National Academy of Sciences. The scientific study of environmental thresholds, their understanding, modeling, and prediction should also be integrated into early warning systems to enable policy makers to understand the challenges and impacts and respond effectively (Srebotnjak et al., 2010). In an increasingly urbanized and globalized world, the boundaries between urban and rural and urban and hinterland are often blurred. The strategies employed should match the context. A holistic view, focused on understanding system structure and behavior, will require building and managing transdisciplinary tools and metrics. Fertilizers, pesticides, and insecticides. This paper focuses on adaptive actions in response to WEF challenges as well as the environmental implications of these responses in Harare, Zimbabwe. Further mapping of these processes, networks, and linkages is important in order to more fully understand the change required at the municipal level to support global sustainability. Learning from existing menu of urban development solutions: Although addressing forced displacement in cities is a relatively new challenge, responses can be informed by proven urban development approaches , ranging from urban upgrading and community driven development to disaster risk management. What are Key Urban Environmental Problems? - Massachusetts Institute of Farmland protection policies are policies that prevent the conversion of agricultural land to anything non-agricultural-related. StudySmarter is commited to creating, free, high quality explainations, opening education to all. Proper land-use designation and infrastructure planning can remedy the effects of urban growth. Improving urban sustainability in London - BBC Bitesize When cities begin to grow quickly, planning and allocation of resources are critical. ), as discussed in Chapter 2. Goals relating to local or global ecological sustainability can be incorporated into the norms, codes, and regulations that influence the built environment. Identify your study strength and weaknesses. Cities with a high number of manufacturing are linked with ____. Discussions should generate targets and benchmarks but also well-researched choices that drive community decision making. Chapter 4 explores the city profiles and the lessons they provide, and Chapter 5 provides a vision for improved responses to urban sustainability. Currently, urban governance is largely focused on single issues such as water. There are six main challenges to urban sustainability. (2012) argued that the laws of thermodynamics and biophysical constraints place limitations on what is possible for all systems, including human systems such as cities. Extreme inequalities threaten public health, economic prosperity, and citizen engagementall essential elements of urban sustainability. Particulate matter, lead, ground level ozone, nitrogen oxide, sulfur oxide, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide. The main five responses to urban sustainability challenges are regional planning efforts, urban growth boundaries, farmland protection policies, and greenbelts. Pathways to Urban Sustainability: Challenges and Opportunities for the United States. True or false? City-regional environmental problems such as ambient air pollution, inadequate waste management and pollution of rivers, lakes and coastal areas. Classifying these indicators as characterizing a driver, a pressure, the state, the impact, or a response may allow for a detailed approach to be used even in the absence of a comprehensive theory of the phenomena to be analyzed. Right? However, some cities are making a much more concerted effort to understand the full range of the negative environmental impacts they produce, and working toward reducing those impacts even when impacts are external to the city itself. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. Conceptually, the idea that there is an ecological footprint, and that sustainable cities are places that seek to minimize this footprint, makes great sense (Portney, 2002). Suburban sprawl is unrestricted growth outside of major urban areas with separate designations for residential, commercial, entertainment, and other services, usually only accessible by car. The key here is to be able to provide information on processes across multiple scales, from individuals and households to blocks and neighborhoods to cities and regions. Second, cities exist as part of integrated regional and global systems that are not fully understood. First, large data gaps exist. Only about 2 hectares (4.94 acres) of such ecosystems are available, however, for each person on Earth (with no heed to the independent requirements of other consumer species). Finally, the redevelopment of brownfields, former industrial areas that have been abandoned, can be an efficient way of re-purposing infrastructure. Regional planning can also help create urban growth boundaries, a limit that determines how far an urban area will develop spatially. Thus, localities that develop an island or walled-city perspective, where sustainability is defined as only activities within the citys boundaries, are by definition not sustainable. Best study tips and tricks for your exams. Over 10 million students from across the world are already learning smarter. Ultimately, the laws of thermodynamics limit the amount of useful recycling. This briefing provides an initial overview of how the . Indeed, often multiple cities rely on the same regions for resources. Although cities concentrate people and resources, and this concentration can contribute to their sustainability, it is also clear that cities themselves are not sustainable without the support of ecosystem services, including products from ecosystems such as raw materials and food, from nonurban areas. It's a monumental task for cities to undertake, with many influences and forces at work. . Urban sustainability is a large and multifaceted topic. Learn about and revise the challenges that some British cities face, including regeneration and urban sustainability, with GCSE Bitesize Geography (AQA). Nongovernmental organizations and private actors such as individuals and the private sector play important roles in shaping urban activities and public perception. Fresh-water rivers and lakes which are replenished by glaciers will have an altered timing of replenishment; there may be more water in the spring and less in the summer. Poor resource management can not only affect residents in cities but also people living in other parts of the world. Urban sustainability therefore requires horizontal and vertical integration across multiple levels of governance, guided by four principles: the planet has biophysical limits, human and natural systems are tightly intertwined and come together in cities, urban inequality undermines sustainability efforts, and cities are highly interconnected. October 15, 2015. The sustainability of a city cannot be considered in isolation from the planets finite resources, especially given the aggregate impact of all cities. 1 Planetary boundaries define, as it were, the boundaries of the planetary playing field for humanity if we want to be sure of avoiding major human-induced environmental change on a global scale (Rockstrm et al., 2009). This helps to facilitate the engagement, buy-in, and support needed to implement these strategies. Cities have captured more than 80 percent of the globes economic activity and offered social mobility and economic prosperity to millions by clustering creative, innovative, and educated individuals and organizations. Cholera, typhoid, diarrhea, hepatitis A, and polio. when people exceed the resources provided by a location. Transportation, industrial facilities, fossil fuels, and agriculture. Key variables to describe urban and environmental systems and their interrelationships; Measurable objectives and criteria that enable the assessment of these interrelationships; and. These strategies should not be developed in isolation, but rather in collaboration with, or ideally, developed by, the practitioners responsible for achieving the goals and targets. However, recent scientific analyses have shown that major cities are actually the safest areas in the United States, significantly more so than their suburban and rural counterparts, when considering that safety involves more than simply violent crime risks but also traffic risks and other threats to safety (Myers et al., 2013).