Climate-Resilient Urban Expansion Planning

This paper explores options for synergising climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts with a methodology for managing urban growth in secondary cities in rapidly urbanising countries. The methodology, urban expansion planning, is an important tool for helping cities prepare for rapid rural-urban migration and urban spatial expansion. It is explored in detail in a new flagship report, Managing Migration and Urban Expansion in Secondary Cities (Lamson-Hall et al. 2022).  Peripheral areas of cities – where most urban growth is occurring – will be more resilient and sustainable if urban expansion plans incorporate climate adaptation and mitigation needs.

Climate adaptation and mitigation efforts will also be more robust if they consider long-term spatial trends in cities, and if urban expansion plans can help manage settlement in high-risk areas. Climate-resilient urban expansion planning will incorporate adaptation and mitigation efforts into the urban expansion planning process. The terms climate-resilient urban expansion planning, and urban expansion planning, are used in the paper to distinguish new climate-resilient aspects of the urban expansion planning process from its platonic form. 

Abstract based directly on source.