congress team:
Pedro Garcia (Portugal/Canada) & Hanna Obracht-Prondzynska (Poland)
Al-Waha is the Arabic term for oasis. It is the haven and habitat for animals and humans trekking across the harsh desert landscapes of the Arabian Peninsula. They are typically formed by underground freshwater aquifers that irrigate the surface to create fertile land which trees and grass could grow on. Oases were of great strategic importance, as they acted as important stops for trade caravans to replenish food and water. As a result, small towns, villages, and cities typically formed around them. Oases required a great deal of technical know-how to take advantage of its arable land and ensure its sustainability for future generations.
The 2020 ISOCARP congress ended with this statement: We advocate (for) a territorial approach to climate action and resilience by promoting place-based policy responses to accelerate efforts to mitigate climate change and to more effectively adapt to its local impacts. (…) This action will rely on systems level change and innovation such as in digitalization, big data, new global economic models (…).
To re-establish a healthy urban environment, we seek to develop policies for adaptable cities to make the built environment more resilient to extreme weather conditions and to diminish challenges such as urban heat islands, pollution, etc. Diminishing biodiversity, unprecedented climate swings and rising maintenance costs are symptoms of a planet struggling with illness. Cities today call for the implementation of circularity, urban metabolism, sponge and ecosystemic approaches. The concepts require a shift in the way cities have been designed when dealing with green infrastructure; planning with nature; regionalization of infrastructure; transportation; sustainable urban development and circular economy. However, without active residents the process of shaping resilient cities will fail. There is an urgent need to enhance social engagement. Resilience and adaptability emerge from interdisciplinary and comparative cases to preserve the setting/world/locality. Recent research that proposes innovative resilience methodologies is also increasingly relevant. Hence the question arises: how to approach urban design and how to shape strategies to mitigate climate changes while enhancing the resilience of cities? What tools for (1) monitoring and assessing urban vulnerability and measuring social attitude towards climate changes (2) enhancing decision making processes and data driven policies for climate changes and resilient urban design (3) strengthening urban adaptability (4) empowering social engagement for shaping resilient cities, are available or are needed by the cities today?
Submittals that cover the following topics are welcome:
Territorial approach to climate action
Place-based policies to mitigate climate change
Data driven policies for resilient urban design
Digitalisation & big data-based models for resilient cities
Assessment of urban vulnerability
Strengthening urban adaptability
Social engagement for shaping resilient cities
Implementation of circularity, urban metabolism, sponge and ecosystemic approaches
