Social equity in urban resilience planning

ABSTRACT

A growing number of cities are incorporating resilience into their plans and policies to respond to shocks, stresses, and uncertainties. While some scholars advocate for the potential of resilience research and practice, others argue that it promotes an inherently conservative and neoliberal agenda, prevents systemic transformations, and pays insufficient attention to power, politics, and justice. Notably, critics of the urban resilience agenda argue that policies fail to adequately address social equity issues. This study seeks to inform these debates by providing a cross-sectional analysis of how issues of equity are incorporated into urban resilience planning. We develop a tripartite framework of equity that includes distributional, recognitional, and procedural dimensions and use it to analyse the goals, priorities, and strategies of formal resilience plans created by member cities of the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities programme. Our analysis reveals considerable variation in the extent to which cities focus on equity, implying that resilience may be more nuanced than some critics suggest. There are, however, clear areas for improvement. Dominant conceptions of equity are generally tied to a distributional orientation, with less focus on the recognitional and procedural dimensions. We hope our conceptual framework and lessons learned from this study can inform more just resilience planning and provide a foundation for future research on the equity implications of resilience.     

Open data and stormwater systems in Los Angeles: applications for equitable green infrastructure

Urban stormwater systems traditionally used “grey” infrastructure to manage runoff. Contemporary designs now incorporate “green” infrastructure, which offers additional potential benefits such as urban amenities and health. Understanding how green and grey infrastructure investments are distributed across urban areas is important for new goals of promoting environmental justice in planning. In California, for instance, public investments increasingly require a percentage of funds to be spent in disadvantaged communities. Recent advancements in the availability of high-detail geographic data in cities can support prioritising investments to fulfil these multiple benefits. This paper analyses the distribution of stormwater infrastructure in Los Angeles (LA) County in relation to design criteria, urban structure and sociodemographic information. It demonstrates an approach for identifying projects that simultaneously address engineering needs and promote equity. Statistical analysis of high-detail sewer locations reveals geographic correlations with key local design parameters, urban characteristics and sociodemographic indicators. Watershed areas in LA County were identified that support multi-benefit projects, meeting dual criteria for infrastructure improvements and disadvantaged community status. As stormwater systems are increasingly designed for multi-benefit outcomes, new design frameworks can emphasise both performance and social equity.     

Public perceptions of equity in environmental policy: Traffic emissions policy in an english urban area

A promising new pathway for research on environmental justice is understanding public perceptions of justice or equity around a range of issues. Here we focus on policies intended to reduce air pollution from road traffic. We ask different urban communities, distinguished by the quality of local air and by socio-economic status, to judge the equitability of policies intended to reduce traffic emissions, both in terms of the environmental benefits of the policies and allocating the financial burden of paying for improvements. In the latter case, we are interested not only in the popular principles of equity that emerge, but also in whether a trade-off might exist between such principles of equity and the overall effectiveness and cost of the policy.     

Urban Environmental Management in Shanghai: Achievements, Problems, and Prospects

This article critically reviews the evolution of urban environmental management in Shanghai since 1978. Established in a transitional postsocialist economy and shaped by a spectacular urban redevelopment process, the current environmental management framework of Shanghai has succeeded in mitigating major industrial pollution and improving urban amenities with unprecedented pace and magnitude. However, it generally failed to take social equity and environmental justice issues into consideration. Based on Haughton’s models of sustainable urban development, this article proposes four priorities and five principles within the framework of a fair shares cities model for the future environmental management of Shanghai and briefly discusses their policy implications and implementation issues. The authors argue that Haughton’s approach is relevant to Shanghai’s case because the essence of his argument—the multidimensional equity principles—is the core of the concept of sustainable development.     

Justice in development? An analysis of water interventions in the rural South

This paper explores a fruitful convergence between the distributive and procedural dimensions of environmental justice theory and current debates in the field of development studies over capitals and capabilities, institutions, and discourse formation to shed new light on natural resource management projects in the developing world. Specifically, we document the planning and implementation of two types of water interventions in two contrasting regions: watershed development programmes in northeast India and small reservoirs in sub‐Saharan West Africa. We find that there is a contradiction between the inherently political nature of water interventions and the fact that such projects remain grounded in apolitical, technical and managerial narratives. In contrast to the new semantic of development, this depoliticization results in the near absence of attention paid to procedural (participation and empowerment) and distributive (equity) justice concerns and in local actors having to revert to covert ways to achieve their ends. A constructive dialogue between development studies and environmental justice scholars can offer a fresh look on the society‐environment nexus in the developing world.     

Economic,ecological, and equity dimensions of brownfield redevelopment plans for environmental justice communities in the USA

ABSTRACT

This paper employs qualitative content analysis to assess 28 brownfield redevelopment plans produced as part of a US Environmental Protection Agency programme. The analysis framework followed the economic, ecological, and social equity dimensions of sustainable development. The findings illustrate that, in terms of economic dimensions, most plans discussed financing the overall project, but few mentioned site values or the pivotal cost of remediating brownfield sites or addressed questions related to liability, the transfer of ownership of sites, or the end use of remediated sites. In terms of ecological dimensions, while many plans suggested “green” uses of existing brownfields, few discussed the impacts of the plans on urban ecological issues or offered technical feasibility of remediating the sites. In terms of social equity dimensions, half of the plans described potential local jobs stemming from the proposed redevelopment, but many did not discuss the human impacts of remediating contaminated sites or the costs of doing nothing. Most plans mentioned community engagement methods but not their outcomes, making the degree to which the lessons gleaned from such engagement influenced the plans totally unclear. Despite the programme’s explicit focus on the nexus of environmental justice and local environments, many plans struggled to address the topic in favour of tackling broader economic, environmental, and equity issues. Overall, this paper contributes to the understanding of brownfield redevelopment planning by not only summarising and synthesising the tendencies of existing plans but also suggesting strategies to address areas in which current planning efforts fall short.     

Environmental justice for the governance of aquatic environments

Environmental justice sheds light on the distributive and procedural aspects of planning and decision-making. We examined the challenges arising from the perspective of environmental justice on multi-level and participatory environmental governance by exploring the governance of aquatic environments in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area. We found three main challenges and potential responses to them. First, even though most of Helsinki’s shoreline is free and/or accessible by road and accordingly used actively by people for recreational purposes, many parts of the shoreline are perceived as inaccessible, reflecting a need to combine factual and perceived accessibility of aquatic environments in detail during the planning processes and to discuss reasons for possible discrepancies between these two. Second, there was a remarkable seasonal variation in the use of aquatic environments, so more attention should be paid to social-demographic factors explaining the distribution of the use of urban nature. Third, it seems to be difficult to capture the variety of perceptions of people and to integrate them into planning and decision-making processes even on a local scale, and this challenge is likely even more pronounced on higher levels of planning and governance. Thus, better integration of regional and local-scale planning procedures should be encouraged. Building on these observations, we conclude that integration of procedural and distributive environmental justice into the practices of the governance of aquatic environments could remarkably decrease unwanted trade-offs and potential conflicts in their use and management.     

Urban/rural division in environmental justice frameworks: revealing modernity-urbanisation nexus in Turkey’s small-scale hydropower development

Environmental justice frameworks predominantly focus on exploration of socio-environmental inequalities faced by racial, ethnic, religious, cultural and low-income groups. This article aims to expand this mainstream focus of the environmental justice concept on these groups by conceptualising urban/rural division as a group difference, based on which rural communities face with socio-environmental burdens of environmental policies in relation to their urban counterparts. It is based on the analysis of Turkey’s small-scale hydroelectricity power plant (HPP) development policies, referring to the planning and constructions of approximately 1500 hydropower plants across the country, along with country’s modernist agenda, i.e. achievement of economic development, social progress and urban transformation of Turkey. These power plants are also strongly associated with numerous socio-economic, environmental and cultural impacts on local rural communities and local environments with dozens of local opposition movements, while favouring needs, interests and lifestyles of urban communities. This point deserves a systematic conceptualisation within the environmental justice frameworks as it helps to further explain deep causes of socio-environmental inequalities particularly in developing country contexts. Thus, this article is built on such a conceptualisation arguing the necessity to integrate urban/rural division as a separate group difference to environmental justice frameworks by examining modernisation and urbanisation nexus in Turkey’s small-scale HPP development process.     

A methodology for estimation of vehicle emissions in an urban environment: an example from Greater Manchester

Road transport is a major contributor to urban air pollution. The introduction of local air qua lity management in the UK will require objective test procedures to evaluate and prioritise the air pollution benefits of existing transport systems and proposed developments. This methodology has been developed to assist the land use and transport planning professionals in evaluating current and potential future impacts on air quality. The method couples an emissions estimation procedure to a traffic flow database. It requires data on emission factors, the composition of the vehicle fleet, vehicle control technologies and the daily traffic flow profile. With these data, it is possible to generate emission estimates per kilometre, link or road as selected by the user. Forecasts can be made by varying input variables. The current methodology allows prediction of five or more pollutant species/classes, limited only by availability of emission factors. The method utilises a commercially available personal computer based spreadsheet. Further coupling of the method to a geographical information system will improve the decision support capability of the method.     

Environmental Justice in Indian Country: Dumpsite Remediation on the Swinomish Indian Reservation

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines environmental justice as the “fair treatment for people of all races, cultures, and incomes, regarding the development of environmental laws, regulations, and policies.” The last decade has focused considerable national attention on the environmental pollution inequity that persists among the nation’s poorest communities. Despite these environmental justice efforts, poor communities continue to face adverse environmental conditions. For the more than 550 Native American communities, the struggle to attain environmental justice is more than a matter of enforcing national laws equitably; it is also a matter of a federal trust duty for the protection of Indian lands and natural resources, honoring a promise that Native American homelands would forever be sustainable. Equally important is the federal promise to assist tribes in managing their reservation environments under their reserved powers of self-government, an attribute that most distinguishes tribes from other communities. The PM Northwest, Inc. (PMNW) dumpsite is located within the boundaries of the Swinomish Indian Reservation in Washington State. Between approximately 1958 and 1970, PMNW contracted with local oil refineries to dispose of hazardous wastes from their operations at the reservation dumpsite. Almost two decades would pass before the Swinomish tribe was able to persuade EPA that a cleanup action under Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) was warranted. This article reviews the enduring struggle to achieve Indian environmental justice in the Swinomish homeland, a process that was dependent upon the development of the tribe’s political and environmental management capacity as well as EPA’s eventual acknowledgement that Indian environmental justice is integrally linked to its federal trust responsibility.     

The case of artisanal mining in Bolivia: Local participatory development and mining investment opportunities

Despite the buoyant expansion of Latin America's mining sector, the small-scale mining sub-sector remains marginalized. For many countries with small-scale mining resources, the way forward to sustainable mining development is not clear. Activities, in far too many cases, have led to environmental damage, social inequity and political violence among mining communities. This article, through a case study of the Bolivian Altiplano, seeks to advance the understanding of the conditions that drive mining communities into the chain of events of impoverishment associated with environmental damage. It also examines the opportunities for sustainable human development among these communities. In Bolivia's mining sector, social inequity is pervasive and holds the mineral resources captive. This situation is further aggravated by the fact that solutions, in the short term, are uncertain. Unresolved social inequity compromises foreign direct investments since social considerations are becoming increasingly important to mining corporations when deciding whether to invest. This article outlines a preliminary strategy to move forward on social inequity. The strategy revolves mainly around implementing alternative sustainable livelihoods with the participation of the government (central and local), the private sector, NGOs and donors as facilitators and partners. Its aim is to reduce the number of families eking out a living from artisanal mining in order to enhance the viability of small-scale mining. It is hoped that, as social inequity decreases throughout the sector, the increased stability will enable stakeholders to consider foreign direct investments within the framework of the country's sustainable human development goals.     

Environmental injustice of informal e-waste recycling in Agbogbloshie-Accra: urban political ecology perspective

This paper provides additional empirical knowledge of injustice embedded in the urban governance of informal-sector electronic waste (e-waste) recycling in Ghana. It uses Urban Political Ecology and Environmental Justice perspectives to explain how divergent interest and power among diverse actors in the e-waste sector engender social and environmental (in)justice in Accra. Using the case study approach, this paper reveals that the persistent struggles over interest and power which characterise the governance and management of informal e-waste recycling generate inequity, false accusations, misrecognition, disrespect, devaluation, neglect, exclusion, and abuse of freedom and rights. Inclusive of the finding is the development of local resistance and social movement in defence of interests and against state aggression, oppression, domination and neglect. The study concludes to suggest that the governance of urban socio-economic and ecological space of Accra should involve coordination, participation, holistic inclusion of diverse interest, so as to minimise trade-offs and reap synergies.     

Hyperautomobility and Governmentality in Auckland

Abstract

A number of cities around the world are associated with very high levels of private motor car usage, and Auckland provides an example of one of these ‘hyperautomobile’ cities. There are many problems with this system of transportation and dependence on the private car, including environmental, social and city design dimensions. Though there is a clear aspiration to move towards reduced levels of car usage in the city's transport and spatial planning strategies, there are major difficulties in implementation terms. We develop and consider future scenarios to 2041 to reduce these levels of motorization, and subsequent transport CO₂ emissions, with a much greater use of public transport, walking and cycling, urban planning, and low emission vehicles. The current implementability of such a ‘sustainable mobility’ future is however questioned in the current political and social context, and critically debated in terms of the available governance mechanisms and the limited attempts to shape the behaviour of the public. We conclude by calling for a reconsideration of the policy measures being considered, including the range and levels of application and investment; with a much wider framing of the transport planning remit, and carried out within a much stronger participatory framework for decision-making.     

Health, Environmental and Social Justice

Health is a basic human right. Improving health requires social and environmental justice and sustainable development. The 'health for all' movement embraces principles shared by other social movements--in sustainable development, community safety and new economics. These principles include equity, democracy, empowerment of individuals and communities, underpinned by supportive environmental, economic and educational measures and multi-agency partnerships. Health promotion is green promotion and inequality in health is due to social and economic inequality. This paper shows how health, environmental and economic sustainability are inextricably linked and how professionals of different disciplines can work together with the communities they serve to improve local health and quality of life. It gives examples of how local policy and programme development for public health improvement can fit in with global and national policy-making to promote health, environmental and social justice.     

Sustainable Development and Structure Plans in England and Wales: Operationalizing the Themes and Principles

This paper explores attempts to operationalize some themes and principles of sustainable developmentin five UK structure plans which performed best in an overview of current practice (Counsell, 1998). Following a summary of literature, the approaches to sustainable development in the five plans-Avon, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Oxfordshire, and West Sussex-are described. The plans are then used to explore the operationalization of a range of resource protection (environmental capacity, environmental capital and the precautionary principle) and socio-economic (social equity, policy integration and participation) themes. It is concluded that the planning system probably provides greater scope for accommodating the resource protection than the socio-economic themes, which are likely to present a considerable challenge in making sustainable development operational in planning.     

Nuclear waste facilities on Tribal Land: The Yami's struggles for environmental justice

This paper examines environmental justice in the context of nuclear waste controversies on Orchid Island, Taiwan. The Yami's anti-nuclear waste movement is a manifestation of problems of distributional inequity, lack of recognition, and limited participation of the tribespeople in decision making. These are interwoven in political and social processes. In addition, the disputes over the nuclear waste problem between the Yami and Taiwanese groups also show the historical and socioeconomic complexity of environmental justice. This study argues that a democratic and participatory procedure is likely to bring recognition or help the situation of lack of recognition improve, which could facilitate more just distribution. Building partnerships and networking within a variety of indigenous environmental organizations as well as other Taiwanese environmental organizations could help to transform the Orchid Island community and the Taiwanese society in the direction of environmental justice.     

Institutional Constraints to Environmentally Sound Integrated Land Use and Transport Policies: Experiences from the Norwegian Integrated Land Use and Transport Planning Scheme

The Norwegian Integrated Land Use and Transport Planning Scheme TP10 was launched in 1991 as a responseto growing concern about the environmental effects of road transport in Norway's largest cities. Its main goal was to develop transport and land use policies leading to reductions in the growth of car use and transport demand. The purpose of this paper is to explain and discuss why the scheme on the whole failed to produce the intended policies. One reason was that the planning process in the scheme was dominated by the traditional transport planning and implementation authorities. The scheme was also linked to the national roads planning process in a way which diverted TP10 from its stated environmental goals. The paper concludes that radical changes in existing policies should be accompanied by institutional reform.     

The Forum Theatre of Augusto Boal: A Dramatic Model for Dialogue and Community-Based Environmental Science

Community oriented environmental science combines the inclusive, action-oriented goals of environmental justice communities and the rationalist methodologies of science in an effort to balance urgent social and physical needs with research protocols, precise analysis and carefully measured conclusions. Community-based participatory research acknowledges that local expertise and networks, adverse social and economic consequences of environmental degradation and community beliefs and attitudes are vital factors that affect both overall community health and research outcomes. A unique CBPR approach to inclusive outreach and education is Community Environmental Forum Theatre (CEFT), developed through the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences Center in Environmental Toxicology at the University of Texas Medical Branch/Galveston TX. CEFT integrates the dramaturgy of Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed and the democratizing dialogic process of Paulo Freire into the design and implementation of environmental health research, community health care and education. CEFT projects throughout the Texas petrochemical belt have used this form of interactive workshop and energized public performance to increase knowledge of toxicological concepts, develop risk awareness, extend and strengthen coalitions, create action agendas and promote community advocacy skills. Boal image-making techniques help to deconstruct concepts such as exposure pathways, dose response, differential susceptibilities, multiple stressors/cumulative risk and the healthy worker effect. Image-based ethnographies provide insight into risk perceptions, risk communication outcomes and overarching community dynamics impacting environmental justice. CEFT project efficacy is evaluated via a multi-frame process focused on goals specific to the roles of the scientific/environmental health outreach specialist, the community development artist/practitioner and the advocate for environmental health and justice issues.     

Nuclear waste facilities on Tribal Land: The Yami's struggles for environmental justice

Abstract

This paper examines environmental justice in the context of nuclear waste controversies on Orchid Island, Taiwan. The Yami's anti-nuclear waste movement is a manifestation of problems of distributional inequity, lack of recognition, and limited participation of the tribespeople in decision making. These are interwoven in political and social processes. In addition, the disputes over the nuclear waste problem between the Yami and Taiwanese groups also show the historical and socioeconomic complexity of environmental justice. This study argues that a democratic and participatory procedure is likely to bring recognition or help the situation of lack of recognition improve, which could facilitate more just distribution. Building partnerships and networking within a variety of indigenous environmental organizations as well as other Taiwanese environmental organizations could help to transform the Orchid Island community and the Taiwanese society in the direction of environmental justice.     

基于BP模型对城市交通噪声的数据处理和预测

城市交通噪声的预测和评价技术是城市交通可持续发展的重要研究内容，直接为城市交通规划中环境容量分析和环境影响评价服务。本文通过实测的大量数据，运用神经网络中的BP模型及其算法建立车辆数、道路宽度和交通噪声之间的关系，对城市道路交通噪声数据进行处理和预测。