Urban planning is key to resilience

Abu Dhabi, 10 February 2019 - UNDRR today launched a new Words into Action guide to coincide with the on-going debate about the shape of the successor to the successful Making Cities Resilient Campaign (MCR) which comes to an end this year.

“The World Urban Forum is a very appropriate launchpad for this Implementation Guide for Land Use and Urban Planning,” said Sanjaya Bhatia, UNDRR head of capacity building, speaking to an audience of city representatives and city managers from around the world.

“Failures in land use and urban planning can seriously undermine a city’s capacity to cope with extreme weather events, earthquakes, technological, biological and environmental hazards,” said Mr. Bhatia.

Mr. Bhatia cited examples from China, New Zealand, and the UK to illustrate how land use and urban planning can play a role in reducing disaster losses in the case of floods and earthquakes. 

He said that the follow-up initiative to the MCR Campaign – MCR2030- would place the emphasis very much on implementation and the guide was a useful tool to build capacity across a city’s management team and to raise awareness among politicians and the general public.

The five-chapter guide is now available online and provides guidance for the urban planning profession and those involved in city development on how to incorporate disaster risk reduction (DRR) and resilience into urban planning decisions and investments.

The first chapter sets the scene, explaining key elements of the post-2015 development agenda, particularly the global plan to reduce disaster losses, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction that has targets for reducing mortality, numbers of people affected by disasters, economic losses and damage to critical infrastructure.

Chapter Two discusses key concepts related to DRR, resilience and urban planning and explores the relationship between them. The third chapter explains how DRR can be integrated into various parts of the urban planning system and throughout the planning cycle. Chapter Four addresses financing and the fifth and final chapter puts forth some conclusions and caveats.

Definitions of key terms are included in boxes where the terms first appear and recapitulated at the end in the Terminology section. There are also several case studies throughout the guide. Each section has a list of resources and tools for further exploration, with a complete list of references compiled at the end of the guide.

The following are particularly acknowledged for their contributions to the new Words into Action along with the members of the Urban Planning Advisory Group of the Making Cities Resilient Campaign: Shipra Narang Suri, UN-Habitat, and from the Bartlett Development Planning Unit, University College London Cassidy Johnson, Barbara Lipietz and Sarah Brennan.