Building Sustainable&Resilient Cities

With over half of the population living in urban areas and the numbers increasing daily, cities are facing unprecedented demographic, environmental, economic, social and spatial challenges.

By 2050, 70% of global population will live in cities. 60% of new urban settlements are yet to be built, representing a huge opportunity for building resilient cities.

A Resilient City assesses, plans and acts to prepare and respond to hazards—natural and human-made, sudden and slow-onset, expected and unexpected—in order to protect and enhance people’s live, secure development gains, foster an environment for investment, and drive positive change.

Major challenges to resilience include economic, environmental, cultural, civic and disaster mitigation and recovery.

Sustainable and resilient urban development cannot be achieved or sustained without mitigation and adaptation measures, such as water recycling, water and energy sensitive urban and building design, sustainable urban planning of city extensions, financial and planning tools for risk management and awareness campaigns for behavioral change.

Unplanned cities are more vulnerable to shocks as they often have to cope with pre-existing stresses. Urban systems are complex and interdependent.