Blogs

To Truly Protect Infrastructure, Face the Climate Reality

By Emil Frankel / On November 28th, 2017

President Trump can make good on his proclamation of November as "Critical Infrastructure and Resilience Month" by facing the facts about our changing climate

New Urbanism isn't dead—it's evolving due to climate change

By Laurie Mazur / On November 6th, 2017

From the CNU Climate Summit, a movement marrying a vision of livable communities to the necessities of a changing climate emerges.

#ForewordFriday: Disaster Recovery Edition

By Katharine Sucher / On June 16th, 2017

What does it mean to be a resilient city in the age of a changing climate and growing inequity? In light of federal inaction on resilience efforts, how do cities create efficient transportation systems, access to healthy green space, and lower-carbon buildings for all citizens? Some of the world’s leading voices on urban issues tackle these questions and more in the fully updated and revised edition of Resilient Cities.

Climate Denial Puts Infrastructure At Risk

By Cathleen Kelly / On May 17th, 2017

Rather than pay much more down the road, President Trump should act now to build infrastructure that can withstand the effects of climate change

Climate Change and Preservation: Where Do They Intersect?

By Stephanie Meeks / On October 5th, 2016

Summertime brings picnics, baseball games, family vacations, and, increasingly, record-busting temperatures. Each of the 10 hottest years on record has happened since 1998, including the hottest of all, 2014. As a preservation community, we are starting to grapple with the effects of this changing climate in very concrete ways.

"Damn Those Congressional Torpedoes, Full Speed Ahead!"

By Hillary Brown / On May 15th, 2014

Last spring's Presidential appeal for fixing the nation’s “raggedy” infrastructure (his word choice) has failed to stir a response from Congress. However, bold moves elsewhere to renew these critical services inspire the title of this post. I’m highlighting the following initiatives because they epitomize the new norms needed to “future-proof” our infrastructure.

Smithsonian Institution Greening Greater Washington seminar

By Admin / On September 7th, 2011

Island Press partnered with the Smithsonian Institution for a Greening Greater Washington Seminar featuring Island Press author Timothy Beatley, author of Biophilic Cities, and Christopher Leinberger, author of The Option of Urbanism.

Two Unmentionable Words

By James S. Russell / On July 19th, 2011

I was in Salt Lake City some time ago and was advised sotto voce that it would be unwise to voice a certain term. In Kansas it’s just not done either, a local explained. Bruce Katz, who heads the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institute no less, suggested less offensive words. These unutterable words? Climate change. In large swaths of the country, bullying by climate-change skeptics has made these words unsuitable for use in civil discourse. “They just start arguments,” people have told me. “People can’t get past those terms. You’ll never reach them,” say most others.

A New World Coming

By George M. Woodwell / On August 14th, 2009

Today we watched the assembly and installation of the thirty-foot blades of a 100 KW wind turbine on the 10 acre campus of the Woods Hole Research Center on the southern coast of Cape Cod.

Island Press Field Notes