Assessing and Intervening: Urban Resilience Indicators

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Urban resilience can be defined as the capacity of a city or urban area to cope with future shocks and change. There has been an increasing interest in this concept as a result of a sense of risk associated with climate change, economic downturn, social unrest and environmental disasters. Systems with increased resilience, it is argued, enable cities to withstand shocks from man-made and natural disasters. A focus on resilience and the resulting strengthening of the self-organisation capacity of urban systems is also seen as a means of improving the sustainability of cities.

This paper reviews concepts of resilience in order to determine key characteristics of the field and how these may be applied to, and measured in, urban environments. Urban resilience indicator systems, tools and related literature are surveyed to understand the current debates within the field and to identify gaps and uncertainties. The survey reveals that there are different understandings of urban resilience and divergent views on how this concept should be applied and measured. The paper analyses these approaches in order to classify and describe competing urban resilience theories as well as their associated intervention strategies and indicators systems.

Within this framework the paper charts potential future research areas that could strengthen the theoretical basis of the urban resilience field as well as its practical application through indicators and indicator systems, as means of improving the resilience of cities and urban areas.

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Built Environment Sustainability Tool

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The Built Environment Sustainability Tool (BEST) has been developed to assess sustainability capability of neighbourhoods and built environments. Gauge was invited by ICLEI at a special Urban-LEDS pre-event training workshop of the Local Climate Solutions for Africa Congress. Professional staff and counsellors from municipalities were trained on the tool and used this to carry out assessments of areas within their municipalities and develop interventions to improve sustainability.

Participants welcomed the approach developed in the methodology and appreciated the simplicity of the tool. In particular, there was positive support for the way in which the methodology was able to address reductions in carbon emission reductions within a sustainable development framework. Participants indicated that this aligned well with sustainable development mandate of local government and the increasing pressure being experienced to accelerate service delivery.

Sarah Bartmann Centre

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Gauge has been appointed as the Sustainability Consultant for the Sarah Bartmann Centre in Hankey, Eastern Cape. This included detailed design guidance and monitoring and evaluation during the construction stages of the project.

Sustainable Built Environment Training

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Gauge was appointed to provide Sustainable Built Environment training in Lusaka, Zambia. The training for built environment professionals was tailored specifically for the local context and introduced the Sustainable Housing Guidelines, also being developed for Zambia. The training included field trips, presentations, groupwork and design excercises.

Enhancing Skills for Sustainable Built Environments

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Gauge has been appointed by the Council of the Built Environment (CBE) to carry out a study on the skills requirements for sustainable built environments in South Africa. The study reviews the existing situation and makes recommendations on skills for sustainable built environments and how these could be enhanced.

Sustainable Housing Guide for Zambia

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Gauge has been appointed to develop Sustainable Housing Guidelines for Zambia. The Guidelines have developed in discussion with a wide range of stakeholders to ensure that they respond directly to the Zambian context. Training on the Guidelines is also being carried out.

Department of Environmental Affairs Building

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Gauge was appointed the Sustainability Technical Adviser to Department of Environment for their Public Private Partnership (PPP) HQ building in Pretoria. Gauge was responsible for advising the client on sustainability aspects of the project and for drafting the sustainability specifications that formed the PPP Agreement. This legal agreement included stringent sustainability criteria which have been reflected in the design.The building was the awarded the Highest Rated Green Building by the Green Building Council of South Africa in South Africa in 2012/2013. The building is carbon positive at weekends when the energy generated by the renewable energy systems exceeds consumption within the building.

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