Innovations in approaches to design and planning can
improve the environmental and economic performance
of places. Our recent sea-level rise planning work with
the Resilient By Design initiative for San Francisco’s Bay
Area utilized a rezoning concept to guide future growth
by encouraging dense and mixed forms of development in
suitable sites while releasing flood-prone areas as a way to
support the region’s flood management strategy.
Innovations in communication and engagement can improve
community and social resilience. While less documented,
social resilience significantly impacts how a community
can self-organize, recover, respond to change and learn.
This starts with ensuring communities are engaged and
empowered and have a collective vision for the future. We
aim to convey the specific relevance of our work to each
community and each place; to listen, absorb and interact
with the community; and to be optimistic, forward-thinking,
memorable and fun – all with the aim of fostering greater
curiosity, enthusiasm and optimism for planning and
design initiatives.Finally, innovations in governance will be necessary to
achieve and implement any large-scale climate adaptation
and resiliency projects. In our work with Resilient By Design,
we defined a new governance framework across jurisdictions
in California’s Silicon Valley. The framework may take the
form of a special district that enables a host of funding
mechanisms to become feasible. Six regional governments,
plus a county water district and NASA would enter a
collaborative agreement to define how the region messages,
deliberates, prioritizes, acquires funds and implements
multi-benefit resiliency projects. While this scale of
cooperative agreement is unprecedented, it is necessary
to protect the region and increase resilience worldwide.04
The South Bay Sponge proposal by
The Field Operations Team (led by
James Corner Field Operations) for
the Resilient By Design initiative
swaps denser inland development
in San Francisco’s Bay Area for
a new resilient shoreline with
wetlands that function as flood
protection. Photo: James Corner
Field Operations.
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