“Every week humans create the equivalent of a city the size of Vancouver.”
This week, all roads seemed to lead to Vancouver.
First, I came across these lovely photos of a beautiful autumn day in Vancouver, Canada.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/miss604/4065488253/in/set-72157600039378766/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/miss604/4065490163/in/set-72157600039378766/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/miss604/4066246438/sizes/o/in/set-72157600039378766/
Stanley Park’s 1,000 acres (400 hectares) make it the third largest urban park in North America.
This past week, Mother Nature Network listed Vancouver as its “Destination of the Week,” proclaiming that: “The city proves that, with a little planning and ingenuity, environmentalism and modernization do not need to be mutually exclusive.”
Then I read this blog post that cited a recent study by Robert MacDonald and Peter Kareiva from the Nature Conservancy. More than half of the six billion people in the world now live in urban areas. By 2030, the figure will be closer to 60 percent.
MacDonald and Kareiva examined the growing urban footprint and its potential impact on biodiversity, and this is what they found:
Ecoregions most affected by urban growth contain some of the highest concentrations of endemic species in the world — these places tend to be small, but significant.
Eight percent of the vertebrate species of the IUCN Red List of endangered species are there largely because of urban development. And that number may continue to rise with new urban expansion and growth.
Around 25 percent of the world’s protected areas will be within a day’s walk or half-hour drive of urban areas by 2030. Such proximity will increase the pressures on natural resources and intensify the threats to these protected places.
Kareiva emphasizes that urbanization and conservation must be considered together:
“We can set up all the reserves we want, but if we do not take care in where we place our cities, how we grow our cities, and how we live in our cities, then we will fail in our mission to protect biodiversity.”
The explosion of cities across the developing world — including megacities and the small to medium-sized cities where most of the population growth will take place — presents significant challenges to governments lacking financial and administrative resources. Robert MacDonald says, “Only by addressing this growing conflict between cities and biodiversity can society achieve genuine conservation in an urbanizing world.”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ecstaticist/2251749148/
Which brings us back to Vancouver. As the Conservancy report suggests, the rate of urbanization worldwide is like adding a city the size of Vancouver every week.
Last month, practitioners and policy makers gathered in Vancouver to discuss ecological governance and sustainable urban systems at the Gaining Ground Summit on “Resilient Cities: Urban Strategies for Transition Times.” At the Summit, Mayor Gregor Robertson introduced Vancouver 2020: A Bright Green Future, a strategy to make Vancouver the Greenest City. In doing so, Vancouver joined New York, Chicago, and other cities that have adopted climate action plans or sustainable development strategies. Portland’s Mayor Sam Adams also spoke about his city’s strategic planning efforts towards being the “most sustainable city.” (Portland released its climate action plan for 2050 last week.) Some interesting coverage of the Summit can be found here, here, and here.
Also of note: the upcoming Winter Olympics in Vancouver will feature carbon offsets for the 118,000 tons of CO2 expected to be released by all activities related to the Games.
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