Planning for cooler cities: a plan quality evaluation for Urban Heat Island consideration

ABSTRACT

City strategic plans and enabling policies provide a framework for and inform future development across multiple scales. An exemplar city strategic plan will be one based on evidence, enabled by complementary policy outcomes, and built on the knowledge of the existing landscape. This study evaluated the plan quality of eighteen metropolitan strategic plans for city members in the 100 Resilient Cities initiative. A protocol was developed containing thirty-two indicators to assess plans capacity to act as a strategic planning tool to develop, analyse and implement strategies for the Urban Heat Island (UHI) and climate change mitigation and adaptation. The evaluation indicated that strategies addressing the UHI are rarely included in metropolitan plans. Strategic plans showed a lack of evidence-base to inform the potential actions. Urban warming is often linked to extreme weather events anticipated under climate change, not the UHI as a systemic and increasing phenomenon. We recommend that the pathway to addressing UHI mitigation and adaptation may lie in its nexus to aspects of climate change that concurrently can serve to support liveable and resilient cities.     

上海人口自然变动负增长与社会经济发展

1993年上海人口自然变动在全国率先进入负增长,自然增长率为-0.78‰,并将持续一个较长的时期。这是长期以来本市经济和社会发展以及计划生育工作共同作用的必然结果,其中计划生育政策的成功推行起着重要的作用。上海除了继续控制人口增长的数量外,还要调节人口规模和人口结构,大力提高人口素质,不断使人口与社会经济发展、生态平衡、资源利用等方面达到协调发展。由负增长引发的劳动力短缺和老龄化程度加剧要采取相应的对策。     

A VSA-Based Strategy for Placing Conservation Buffers in Agricultural Watersheds

Conservation buffers have the potential to reduce agricultural nonpoint source pollution and improve terrestrial wildlife habitat, landscape biodiversity, flood control, recreation, and aesthetics. Conservation buffers, streamside areas and riparian wetlands are being used or have been proposed to control agricultural nonpoint source pollution. This paper proposes an innovative strategy for placing conservation buffers based on the variable source area (VSA) hydrology. VSAs are small, variable but predictable portion of a watershed that regularly contributes to runoff generation. The VSA-based strategy involves the following three steps: first, identifying VSAs in landscapes based on natural characteristics such as hydrology, land use/cover, topography and soils; second, targeting areas within VSAs for conservation buffers; third, refining the size and location of conservation buffers based on other factors such as weather, environmental objectives, available funding and other best management practices. Building conservation buffers in VSAs allows agricultural runoff to more uniformly enter buffers and stay there longer, which increases the buffers capacity to remove sediments and nutrients. A field-scale example is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of the within-VSA conservation buffer scenario relative to a typical edge-of-field buffer scenario. The results enhance the understanding of hydrological processes and interactions between agricultural lands and conservation buffers in agricultural landscapes, and provide practical guidance for land resource managers and conservationists who use conservation buffers to improve water quality and amenity values of agricultural landscape.     

Using Multicriteria Methods in Environmental Planning and Management

In environmental planning and decision processes several alternatives are analyzed in terms of multiple noncommensurate criteria, and many different stakeholders with conflicting preferences are involved. Based on our experience in real-life applications, we discuss how multicriteria decision aid (MCDA) methods can be used successfully in such processes. MCDA methods support these processes by providing a framework for collecting, storing, and processing all relevant information, thus making the decision process traceable and transparent. It is therefore possible to understand and explain why, under several conflicting preferences, a particular decision was made. The MCDA framework also makes the requirements for new information explicit, thus supporting the allocation of resources for the process.     

土地利用总体规划修编重点与难点问题探讨

土地利用总体规划是国民经济和社会发展规划的重要组成部分,是统筹城乡建设、加强土地管理的基础,是实现世界上最严格的耕地保护制度的基本手段。在新一轮土地利用总体规划修编之际,对上轮规划存在的主要问题从宏观层面上进行了分析与探讨,有助于新一轮规划的科学编制和有效实施。简要介绍了规划修编的背景,并对本轮规划修编的网上调查结果进行了分析。通过回顾和分析上一轮土地利用总体规划实施过程中存在的主要问题,提出本轮规划修编应以统筹城乡发展、加强部门协调、促进节约集约、合理增加弹性、提高公众参与等为理念,并就本轮规划的重点与难点方面提出了建设性的意见和建议。     

面向2020年我国安全生产的若干战略问题思考

本文简要论述了我国现代化进程中安全生产工作的现状、发展趋势和面临的主要问题;围绕2020年实现全国安全生产状况根本性好转,安全生产水平达到或接近世界中等发达国家水平的中长期目标,分析探讨了安全专业人才、科技兴安、安全生产标准、安全培训、安全文化、中小企业安全生产与职业危害预防、土地使用安全规划与厂房选址安全、农业生产安全、公共安全与应急救援保障体系建设等若干战略问题。     

Organizational learning during policy implementation: lessons from U.S. forest planning

ABSTRACT

Learning is critical for land management agencies implementing new policies in the face of rapid social and ecological change. We investigated learning in the U.S. Forest Service as it implemented new planning regulations. Our research objectives were to: (1) identify collective learning processes and outcomes during this time, and (2) understand factors within the organization supporting or impeding learning. Based on participant observation and 25 interviews with planning personnel, we found evidence of collective learning on individual national forests and across the organization. Several factors helped the agency act as a ‘learning organization,’ including internal networks and tools for information sharing, and meetings for staff to exchange lessons learned. Learning was compromised by limited time and capacity, and lack of internal clarity about balancing the desire for innovation with the need to ensure legal compliance and meet deadlines. This work contributes to the empirical foundations of collective learning theory, allowing us to identify learning processes and outcomes at multiple levels in a public organization, and identifying topics for future research. Based on our exploration of organizational learning, we offer suggestions for how to effectively support learning during times of new policy implementation.     

A DYNAMIC MODEL FOR WATER AND RELATED LAND RESOURCE PLANNING1

ABSTRACT. Planning an optimal system of activities for generating economic goods and services within an existing natural resource capacity is a difficult problem to solve. A mathematical programming model with the capacity to check multiple resource demand and supply compatibility over many time periods was developed for the solution to this type of problem. The characteristics of natural resource supply and the demand of activities were utilized to reduce the number of time periods and to minimize the loss of the dynamic reality of the problem. Reduction in the number of time periods extended the capability of the model to the solution of complex resource planning problems without oversimplification.     

PLANNING FOR THE REHABILITATION OF GRAVEL PITS1

ABSTRACT: By field investigations and planning, it is profitable to rehabilitate gravel pits as recreational lakes in urban areas. Some of the important aspects to be considered are topography, soil, surface water and groundwater. A case study is presented and some general guidelines in the rehabilitation process are given. This kind of a use for derelict land is important at the present time as there is a growing demand for recreational lakes in urban areas.