Natural Resources & Sustainability Archives - Page 5 of 19

City Planning Policies to Support Health and Sustainability: An International Comparison of Policy Indicators for 25 Cities

Lowe, Melanie; Adlakha, Deepti; Sallis, James F.; Salvo, Deborah; Cerin, Ester; Moudon, Anne Vernez; Higgs, Carl; Hinckson, Erica; Arundel, Jonathan; Boeing, Geoff; Liu, Shiqin; Mansour, Perla; Gebel, Klaus; Puig-ribera, Anna; Mishra, Pinki Bhasin; Bozovic, Tamara; Carson, Jacob; Dygryn, Jan; Florindo, Alex A.; Ho, Thanh Phuong; Hook, Hannah; Hunter, Ruth F.; Lai, Poh-chin; Molina-garcia, Javier; Nitvimol, Kornsupha; Oyeyemi, Adewale L.; Ramos, Carolina D. G.; Resendiz, Eugen; Troelsen, Jens; Witlox, Frank; Giles-corti, Billie. (2022). City Planning Policies to Support Health and Sustainability: An International Comparison of Policy Indicators for 25 Cities. Lancet Global Health, 10(6), E882-E894.

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Abstract

City planning policies influence urban lifestyles, health, and sustainability. We assessed policy frameworks for city planning for 25 cities across 19 lower-middle-income countries, upper-middle-income countries, and high-income countries to identify whether these policies supported the creation of healthy and sustainable cities. We systematically collected policy data for evidence-informed indicators related to integrated city planning, air pollution, destination accessibility, distribution of employment, demand management, design, density, distance to public transport, and transport infrastructure investment. Content analysis identified strengths, limitations, and gaps in policies, allowing us to draw comparisons between cities. We found that despite common policy rhetoric endorsing healthy and sustainable cities, there was a paucity of measurable policy targets in place to achieve these aspirations. Some policies were inconsistent with public health evidence, which sets up barriers to achieving healthy and sustainable urban environments. There is an urgent need to build capacity for health-enhancing city planning policy and governance, particularly in low-income and middle-income countries.

Keywords

Physical-activity; Population Health; Walkability

On the Tradeoffs between Embodied and Operational Carbon in Building Envelope Design: The Impact of Local Climates and Energy Grids

Echenagucia, Tomas Mendez; Moroseos, Teresa; Meek, Christopher. (2023). On the Tradeoffs between Embodied and Operational Carbon in Building Envelope Design: The Impact of Local Climates and Energy Grids. Energy & Buildings, 278.

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Abstract

The building envelope has a substantial influence on a building's life cycle operational and embodied car-bon emissions. Window-to-wall ratios, wall assemblies, shading and glazing types, have been shown to have a significant impact on total emissions. This paper provides building designers, owners, and policy makers with actionable guidance and a prioritization framework for establishing co-optimized lifecycle carbon performance of facade assembly components in a broad spectrum of climate contexts and energy carbon intensities. A large parametric study of building envelopes is conducted using building perfor-mance simulation and cradle-to-gate embodied carbon calculations in 6 US cities. The authors derive the total carbon emissions optimization for commercial office and residential space types using standard code-reference models and open-source lifecycle data. Comparisons between optimal total carbon solu-tions and (i) optimal operational carbon and (ii) minimum required assemblies, show the impact of under and over investing in envelope-related efficiency measures for each climate. Results show how the rela-tionship between embodied and operational carbon is highly localized, that optimal design variables can vary significantly. In low carbon intensity energy grids, over investment in envelope embodied carbon can exceed as 10 kgCO2e/m2, while under investment in high carbon intensity grids can be higher than 150 kgCO2e/m2.Published by Elsevier B.V.

Keywords

Facades; Building-integrated Photovoltaic Systems; Carbon Emissions; Carbon; Building Performance; Building Designers; Building Envelopes; Refuse Containers; Building Performance Simulation; Embodied Carbon; Operational Carbon; Parametric Modeling; Environmental-impact; Search

Using Open Data and Open-source Software to Develop Spatial Indicators of Urban Design and Transport Features for Achieving Healthy and Sustainable Cities

Boeing, Geoff; Higgs, Carl; Liu, Shiqin; Giles-corti, Billie; Sallis, James F.; Cerin, Ester; Lowe, Melanie; Adlakha, Deepti; Hinckson, Erica; Moudon, Anne Vernez; Salvo, Deborah; Adams, Marc A.; Barrozo, Ligia, V; Bozovic, Tamara; Delclos-alio, Xavier; Dygryn, Jan; Ferguson, Sara; Gebel, Klaus; Thanh Phuong Ho; Lai, Poh-chin; Martori, Joan C.; Nitvimol, Kornsupha; Queralt, Ana; Roberts, Jennifer D.; Sambo, Garba H.; Schipperijn, Jasper; Vale, David; Van De Weghe, Nico; Vich, Guillem; Arundel, Jonathan. (2022). Using Open Data and Open-source Software to Develop Spatial Indicators of Urban Design and Transport Features for Achieving Healthy and Sustainable Cities. Lancet Global Health, 10(6), E907-E918.

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Abstract

Benchmarking and monitoring of urban design and transport features is crucial to achieving local and international health and sustainability goals. However, most urban indicator frameworks use coarse spatial scales that either only allow between-city comparisons, or require expensive, technical, local spatial analyses for within-city comparisons. This study developed a reusable, open-source urban indicator computational framework using open data to enable consistent local and global comparative analyses. We show this framework by calculating spatial indicators-for 25 diverse cities in 19 countries-of urban design and transport features that support health and sustainability. We link these indicators to cities' policy contexts, and identify populations living above and below critical thresholds for physical activity through walking. Efforts to broaden participation in crowdsourcing data and to calculate globally consistent indicators are essential for planning evidence-informed urban interventions, monitoring policy effects, and learning lessons from peer cities to achieve health, equity, and sustainability goals.

Keywords

Systems; Access; Care

Qing Shen awarded funding for commute research survey

The Mobility Innovation Center announced that Qing Shen, professor of Urban Design & Planning and an expert in transportation planning and policy, has received a $100,000 award to study commuting patterns and develop a model to understand the effect of telework and flexible scheduling. The project will build off the existing Commute Trip Reduction (CTR) survey for employers who are in the CTR program as required by state law in the central city portion of Seattle. In addition, a complementary…

Lingzi Wu

Lingzi Wu is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Construction Management (CM) at the University of Washington (UW). Prior to joining UW in September 2022, Dr. Wu served as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Alberta, where she received her MSc and PhD in Construction Engineering and Management in 2013 and 2020 respectively. Prior to her PhD, Dr. Wu worked in the industrial construction sector as a project coordinator with PCL Industrial Management from 2013 to 2017.

An interdisciplinary scholar focused on advancing digital transformation in construction, Dr. Wu’s current research interests include (1) integration of advanced data analytics and complex system modeling to enhance construction practices and (2) development of human-in-the-loop decision support systems to improve construction performance (e.g., sustainability and safety). Dr. Wu has published 10 papers in top journals and conference proceedings, including the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, and Automation in Construction. Her research and academic excellence has received notable recognition, including a “Best Paper Award” at the 17th International Conference on Modeling and Applied Simulation, and the outstanding reviewer award from the Journal of Construction Engineering and Management.

As an educator and mentor, Dr. Wu aims to create an inclusive, innovative, and interactive learning environment where students develop personal, technical, and transferable skills to grow today, tomorrow, and into the future.

Celina Balderas Guzmán

Celina Balderas Guzmán, PhD, is Assistant Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture. Dr. Balderas’ research spans environmental planning, design, and science and focuses on climate adaptation to sea level rise on the coast and urban stormwater inland. On the coast, her work demonstrates specific ways that the climate adaptation actions of humans and adaptation of ecosystems are interdependent. Her work explores how these interdependencies can be maladaptive by shifting vulnerabilities to other humans or non-humans, or synergistic. Using ecological modeling, she has explored these interdependencies focusing on coastal wetlands as nature-based solutions. Her work informs cross-sectoral adaptation planning at a regional scale.

Inland, Dr. Balderas studies urban stormwater through a social-ecological lens. Using data science and case studies, her work investigates the relationship between stormwater pollution and the social, urban form, and land cover characteristics of watersheds. In past research, she developed new typologies of stormwater wetlands based on lab testing in collaboration with environmental engineers. The designs closely integrated hydraulic performance, ecological potential, and recreational opportunities into one form.

Her research has been funded by major institutions such as the National Science Foundation, National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center, UC Berkeley, and the MIT Abdul Latif Jameel Water and Food Systems Lab. She has a PhD in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning from the University of California, Berkeley. Previously, she obtained masters degrees in urban planning and urban design, as well as an undergraduate degree in architecture all from MIT.

Narjes Abbasabadi

Narjes Abbasabadi, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Washington. Dr. Abbasabadi also leads the Sustainable Intelligence Lab. Abbasabadi’s research centers on sustainability and computation in the built environment. Much of her work focuses on advancing design research efforts through developing data-driven methods, workflows, and tools that leverage the advances in digital technologies to enable augmented intelligence in performance-based and human-centered design. With an emphasis on multi-scale exploration, her research investigates urban building energy flows, human systems, and environmental and health impacts across scales—from the scale of building to the scale of neighborhood and city.

Abbasabadi’s research has been published in premier journals, including Applied Energy, Building and Environment, Energy and Buildings, Environmental Research, and Sustainable Cities and Society. She received honors and awards, including “ARCC Dissertation Award Honorable Mention” (Architectural Research Centers Consortium (ARCC), 2020), “Best Ph.D. Program Dissertation Award” (IIT CoA, 2019), and 2nd place in the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Race to Zero Design Competition (DOE, 2018). In 2018, she organized the 3rd IIT International Symposium on Buildings, Cities, and Performance. She served as editor of the third issue of Prometheus Journal, which received the 2020 Haskell Award from AIA New York, Center for Architecture.

Prior to joining the University of Washington, she taught at the University of Texas at Arlington and the Illinois Institute of Technology. She also has practiced with several firms and institutions and led design research projects such as developing design codes and prototypes for low-carbon buildings. Most recently, she practiced as an architect with Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture (AS+GG), where she has been involved in major projects, including the 2020 World Expo. Abbasabadi holds a Ph.D. in Architecture from the Illinois Institute of Technology and Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Architecture from Tehran Azad University.

Carbon Consequences of Land Cover Change and Expansion of Urban Lands: A Case Study in the Seattle Metropolitan Region

Hutyra, Lucy R.; Yoon, Byungman; Hepinstall-Cymerman, Jeffrey; Alberti, Marina. (2011). Carbon Consequences of Land Cover Change and Expansion of Urban Lands: A Case Study in the Seattle Metropolitan Region. Landscape And Urban Planning, 103(1), 83 – 93.

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Abstract

Understanding the role humans play in modifying ecosystems through changing land cover is central to addressing our current and emerging environmental challenges. In particular, the consequences of urban growth and land cover change on terrestrial carbon budgets is a growing issue for our rapidly urbanizing planet. Using the lowland Seattle Statistical Metropolitan Area (MSA) region as a case study, this paper explores the consequences of the past land cover changes on vegetative carbon stocks with a combination of direct field measurements and a time series of remote sensing data. Between 1986 and 2007, the amount of urban land cover within the lowland Seattle MSA more than doubled, from 1316 km(2) to 2798 km(2), respectively. Virtually all of the urban expansion was at the expense of forests with the forested area declining from 4472 km(2) in 1986 to 2878 km(2) in 2007. The annual mean rate of urban land cover expansion was 1 +/- 0.6% year(-1). We estimate that the impact of these regional land cover changes on aboveground carbon stocks was an average loss of 1.2 Mg C ha(-1) yr(-1) in vegetative carbon stocks. These carbon losses from urban expansion correspond to nearly 15% of the lowland regional fossil fuel emissions making it an important, albeit typically overlooked, term in regional carbon emissions budgets. As we plan for future urban growth and strive for more ecologically sustainable cities, it is critical that we understand the past patterns and consequences of urban development to inform future land development and conservation strategies. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords

Sprawl; Growth; Carbon Cycle; Emissions; Land Cover; Urbanization; Seattle; Vegetation; Carbon; Carbon Sinks; Case Studies; Cities; Ecosystems; Forests; Fossil Fuels; Humans; Land Use; Planning; Remote Sensing; Time Series Analysis

Global Urban Signatures of Phenotypic Change in Animal and Plant Populations

Alberti, Marina; Correa, Cristian; Marzluff, John M.; Hendry, Andrew P.; Palkovacs, Eric P.; Gotanda, Kiyoko M.; Hunt, Victoria M.; Apgar, Travis M.; Zhou, Yuyu. (2017). Global Urban Signatures of Phenotypic Change in Animal and Plant Populations. Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America, 114(34), 8951 – 8956.

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Abstract

Humans challenge the phenotypic, genetic, and cultural makeup of species by affecting the fitness landscapes on which they evolve. Recent studies show that cities might play a major role in contemporary evolution by accelerating phenotypic changes in wildlife, including animals, plants, fungi, and other organisms. Many studies of ecoevolutionary change have focused on anthropogenic drivers, but none of these studies has specifically examined the role that urbanization plays in ecoevolution or explicitly examined its mechanisms. This paper presents evidence on the mechanisms linking urban development patterns to rapid evolutionary changes for species that play important functional roles in communities and ecosystems. Through a metaanalysis of experimental and observational studies reporting more than 1,600 phenotypic changes in species across multiple regions, we ask whether we can discriminate an urban signature of phenotypic change beyond the established natural baselines and other anthropogenic signals. We then assess the relative impact of five types of urban disturbances including habitat modifications, biotic interactions, habitat heterogeneity, novel disturbances, and social interactions. Our study shows a clear urban signal; rates of phenotypic change are greater in urbanizing systems compared with natural and nonurban anthropogenic systems. By explicitly linking urban development to traits that affect ecosystem function, we can map potential ecoevolutionary implications of emerging patterns of urban agglomerations and uncover insights for maintaining key ecosystem functions upon which the sustainability of human wellbeing depends.

Keywords

Phenotypes; Plant Populations; Animal Populations; Biological Evolution; Ecosystems; Urbanization; Sustainability; Anthropocene; Ecoevolution; Ecosystem Function; Modern Life; Evolutionary; Patterns; Ecology; Rates; Disturbance; Dynamics; Traits; Pace; Studies; Genotype & Phenotype; Sustainable Development; Anthropogenic Factors; Fitness; Human Influences; Urban Areas; Urban Development; Species; Disturbances; Wildlife; Fungi; Wildlife Habitats; Social Interactions; Social Factors; Plants (botany); Landscape

Cohort Profile: Twins Study of Environment, Lifestyle Behaviours and Health

Duncan, Glen E.; Avery, Ally; Hurvitz, Philip M.; Moudon, Anne Vernez; Tsang, Siny; Turkheimer, Eric. (2019). Cohort Profile: Twins Study of Environment, Lifestyle Behaviours and Health. International Journal Of Epidemiology, 48(4), 1041.

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Keywords

Twin Studies; Neighborhoods; Native Americans; Normalized Difference Vegetation Index; Life Style; Twins; Body-mass Index; Physical-activity; Neighborhood Walkability; Waist Circumference; Built Environment; Causal Inference; Deprivation; Validation; Registry; Obesity