PARENT SESSION
Symposium #19: Cities of Resilience: Integrating Ecology into Urban Planning, Design, Policy, and Management .
Organized by: L Musacchio and J Wu
Wednesday, August 7. 8:00 AM to 11:30 AM. Leo Rich Theatre.
Cities of Resilience: Four themes of the symposium.
Musacchio, Laura*,1, Wu, Jianguo*,2, 1 Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ2 Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
ABSTRACT- The United Nations estimates the number of urban dwellers will exceed the number of rural dwellers by 2010. Along with this trend come other long-term environmental changes in urban ecosystems such as alterations in habitat, climate, and water resources. Certain disciplines, such as planning and design, will determine how policies, plans, designs, and management strategies respond to the long-term environmental changes in urban ecosystems. New research initiatives in urban ecology in the North America, Asia, and Europe represent an unprecedented opportunity for a broader dialogue between ecologists, social scientists, planners, and designers about the future of cities worldwide. However, the integration of ecological research into urban policies, plans, design, and management strategies is complex. In order to address this challenge, natural and social scientists as well as planners and designers will need to develop interdisciplinary approaches for understanding the effects of long-term changes in urban spatial patterns, landscapes, and environmental quality, and planners and designers will need to be able to utilize this information in the development of sustainable human settlements. The symposium, Cities of Resilience, explores these questions by bringing together a group of leading urban ecologists, social scientists, planners, and designers to discuss how interdisciplinary approaches between the disciplines of ecology, planning, and design could be developed. The symposium will highlight how ecological principles could be integrated into urban planning, design, policy, and management through the review of theories, concepts, methodologies, issues, and case studies. In order to stimulate interdisciplinary dialogue during the symposium four themes are proposed to help create a common thread for reflection and discussion between the presentations: (1) defining the City of Resilience, (2) integrating ecological concepts into urban plans, designs, policies, and management strategies, (3) developing interdisciplinary research, scholarship, and collaboration, and (4) emerging areas of interdisciplinary inquiry.
KEY WORDS: Urban ecology, Landscape ecology, Land-use planning and policy, Interdisciplinary research