Archinect - News

New York City MTA releases 20-Year Needs Assessment plan... sans price tag

2023-10-13T12:06:00-04:00

Some 400 miles of subway tracks, half of Metro-North’s Hudson Line and several Long Island Rail Road stations are in dire need of upgrades to stave off flooding and other extreme weather exacerbated by climate change, the MTA wrote in a report published on Wednesday. The report, called the 20-year needs assessment, is a breakdown of the agency’s $1.5 trillion worth of transit infrastructure, and details which equipment planners believe most urgently needs fixing over the next two decades.

The system, which is now (finally) on a more stable financial track, needs a litany of upgrades over the next two decades, according to the breakdown. A total of 350 of the 493 elevators operated by the MTA will need to be replaced in that timeframe. Another 6,300 rail cars and 100% of all 6,000 city buses will also need to be replaced. (The full assessment can be found here.)

The findings were published in advance of a five-year construction phase that begins in 2025, though an exact price tag for the slate of fixes has yet to be established by the agency.

Another audit from the state comptroller’s office released last week indicated that the MTA has not sufficiently used money from capital improvement projects to mitigate against the effects of climate change, as was made apparent by the September 29 catastrophic rain event.

Scientific American opinion piece calls on building codes to ‘save money and lives’

2023-09-06T10:43:00-04:00

Scientific American has published an opinion piece by the publication’s editors, highlighting the role of building codes in saving “money and lives.” Citing the growing number of “multibillion-dollar disasters” striking the United States, the opinion piece makes the argument that buildings built to meet or surpass stricter building codes have demonstrated more resiliency than buildings built before such codes were introduced.

In setting out its case, the piece looks to the model standards set by the International Code Council, which are updated every three years in response to testing of building methods, surveys conducted after disasters, and other research. The editors cite a 2018 Land Economics study that found that houses built after Florida adopted statewide codes based on the ICC’s model say 72% fewer insured losses from wind-related damage, while a separate FEMA/National Institute of Building Sciences report found that for every $1 spent on conforming to the 2018 ICC code, $1...

Boston needs a $877 million flood barrier by 2070, according to Arup

2023-06-08T17:21:00-04:00

Arup has recommended enacting a new 1.5-mile-long protective wall following the results of a new study calling for an $877 million flood barrier protecting the central waterfront of Downtown Boston.

The recommendations call for a barrier to be put in place between Christopher Columbus Park and Congress Street in order to protect the city’s commercial, historic, and governmental structures from the devastating effects caused by an anticipated 51-inch rise in sea level that could cause some $3.9 billion in damages by the year 2070.

“It’s a really, really scary report to be honest,” Marc Margulies, principal of Boston-based architecture firm Margulies Perruzzi, told Banker & Tradesman. “Nobody wants to do this. Nobody wants to spend the money on it. But we have to do this.”

Previously on Archinect: Boston architects create a waterfront hotel with permeable ground floor to prepare for sea level rise

The report indicated City Hall could be susceptible to flood damage, which would also dev...

NYC completes work on East Side Coastal Resiliency project's first phase, Stuyvesant Cove Park in Manhattan

2023-06-02T17:57:00-04:00

This Wednesday marked the long-awaited opening of BIG’s planned Stuyvesant Cove Park in Manhattan, marking an end to what was for some a contentious process that drew ire from various community groups on the two-year path towards its eventual completion.

Commissioned to be a first-line response to the damage caused to the city during 2012’s Hurricane Sandy, the park becomes the second completed phase of the $1.45 billion East Side Coastal Resiliency (ESCR) project and will be joined later in the summer by an additional segment between East 18th and East 20th Streets.

The city’s Deputy Mayor of Operations, Meera Joshi, said: “Preserving and enhancing public spaces with waterfront views, must be an objective for all coastal resiliency projects. The opening of this phase of ESCR comes at a time when residents will benefit from its design the most, and not just because it’s the start of hurricane season, but also because the warm weather is here.”

Image courtesy NYC Department of Design...

World’s tallest full-scale building earthquake test takes place at UC San Diego

2023-05-10T15:09:00-04:00

UC San Diego has hosted the tallest full-scale seismic building test on an earthquake simulator. The LEVER Architecture-designed 10-story building, made of cross-laminated timber, was tested on what the organizers say is the world’s largest outdoor shake table.

Image credit: UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering

Tests on the structure began in late April, where a shake table simulated earthquake motions recorded during prior earthquakes covering a range of magnitude 4 to magnitude 8 on the Richter scale. The range also included various iterations of the 6.7 magnitude Northridge Earthquake which struck Los Angeles in 1994.

Image credit: UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering

The shake table used in the test has been designed to “reproduce the full 3D ground motions that occur during earthquakes” including a movement of up to six degrees of freedom. Atop the table is what the team has dubbed the Tallwood building: A 116-foot-tall cross-laminated timber structure roughly one-fifth...

MVRDV produces a catalogue for cities facing sea level rise as part of Vancouver competition

2023-01-30T10:51:00-05:00

MVRDV has released a series of proposals to respond to rising sea levels in Vancouver. Working as part of a North Creek Collective team, the Dutch firm produced a catalogue of options for adaptive buildings aimed to inspire other coastal cities to “undertake immediate action to adapt to climate change.”

Concept for Coopers' Park, Vancouver for 2040. Image credit: MVRDV

The catalogue was originally produced as part of North Creek Collective’s entry to Vancouver’s Sea2City Design Challenge, a contest that invited teams to investigate the urban future of a body of water at the heart of Vancouver named False Creek. In contrast to typical responses to sea level rise that concentrate on defensive measures such as flood barriers and dikes, the catalogue asks the question: “what if cities learned to work with water, rather than against it?”

Concept for In Between Bridges, Vancouver for 2040. Image credit: MVRDV

The catalogue responds with a variety of possible solutions for adapting waterfron...

Denmark is moving forward with a controversial man-made storm barrier in Copenhagen

2023-01-13T14:54:00-05:00

In January 2022, a team of developers, architects and environmental consultants began work on a 50-year project that — if completed — will become one of Denmark's most ambitious and controversial infrastructure schemes to date: A 271-acre man-made peninsula devised to shield its capital, Copenhagen, from rising sea levels. But the multi-million dollar environmental project has drawn vocal criticism — primarily, and somewhat ironically, from those concerned about the climate.

Despite its intent, Copenhageners have lodged multiple unsuccessful attempts at halting Lynetteholm’s construction in the European Parliament and national assembly. The design calls for a linear wall shielding 35,000 new homes that can be bolstered as necessary in what is called a “process landscape.” Environmentalist opponents have answered back with claims of “maladaptation.” It will eventually join a currently under-development modular floating habitation from the Danish studio MAST that will take shape in segments over the coming decade.

New York City to implement infrastructure program that would convert public surfaces into floodwater sponges

2022-10-13T13:44:00-04:00

Most of New York City — more than 70% — can’t absorb rain due to all its concrete and pavement. This often leaves water falling from the sky with no place to go, leading to catastrophic and deadly flash floods. These calamities are especially common during cloudbursts, defined as a sudden but brief concentrations of heavy precipitation that typically accompany unusually hot weather, such as summer thunderstorms. Scientists expect the problem to worsen with climate change.

In response, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection has recently proposed an array of stormwater resilience strategies. One such plan is the Cloudburst Management plan, which will utilize a combination of grey infrastructure, such as sewer pipers and underground storage tanks, and green infrastructure, like trees and rain gardens, to absorb, store, and divert stormwater. Public locations, such as playgrounds and basketball courts, would double as temporary holding tanks.

This graphic shows a basketball court that would absorb water through a porous pavement during storms. Image: NYC DEP

This strategy aims to assist the city’s 150-year-old sewer system, which can only handle 1.75 inches of rain per hour. As reported by Gothamist, the technologies used for cloudburst management could handle up to 2.3 inches of hourly rainfall. New York City is funding the initiative with municipal and federal money from the likes of FEMA’s Building Resilient Infrastructure and Commun...

Building codes saved this Florida town from Hurricane Ian’s ravages

2022-10-03T17:30:00-04:00

Once the storm passed, the sight of Punta Gorda may have surprised some people. While it had typical post-hurricane storm debris, downed trees and several flooded streets, a number of homes and buildings appeared largely intact and many showed only minimal damage to their exteriors. How is it possible that the coastal city wasn’t more devastated by a storm that ranks among the most powerful to ever strike the United States? One major factor, according to some experts, are modern building code

While other southwest Florida communities like Fort Myers were devastated, Punta Gorda, a town of about 20,000, was saved thanks to strident code changes enacted in the wake of 1992’s Hurricane Andrew and Hurricane Charley twelve years later.

“It’s a demonstration that updated building codes really work,” University at Buffalo architecture professor Nicholas Rajkovich told the Post. Stricter structural load continuity, impact-resistant windows, and hurricane shutters are all hallmarks of a so-called “modern” code whose continued absence the AIA warned against earlier in the summer. Florida alone has an estimated $3.7 trillion worth of properties that are susceptible to storm and wind damage, making the need to further adapt lessons offered by the survival of Punta Gorda's Harvard Jolly-restored Charlotte High School imperative in the minds of experts statewide.

Previously on Archinect: The building industry is preventing resiliency efforts in areas increasingly affected by deadly st...

The Army Corps of Engineers reveals initial coastal resiliency plan for New York City

2022-10-03T09:00:00-04:00

The federal government wants to build a massive system of storm surge gates and seawalls to protect the New York harbor region from flooding and has put forth a much-delayed plan that would remake coastal areas from upper Manhattan down to Jamaica Bay. The Army Corps estimates construction on the $52 billion project would begin in 2030 and be complete by 2044. The project must be first approved by federal, state and local officials and funded before any of the work can start.

The New York District, North Atlantic Division of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has released a 569-page report outlining a coastal storm risk management feasibility study. According to The City's Samantha Maldonado, a public comment period will be held through January 6th, 2023, as a means to help "inform the design." Maldonado also reported that the government expects plans to be finalized by 2025.

The Army Corps also released an interactive map that details individual aspects of the initial proposal, which Columbia University climate scientist Paul Gallay said will "set the tone for coastal protection and community viability for decades to come."

"We have a lot more room to advocate for environmental justice communities and truly sustainable solutions than many of the other plans would have allowed for," Victoria Sanders, a research analyst at the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance, told the publication. "There is still a long road and a lot of unknowns between now a...

Battery Park City gears up for major transformation that will make it more resilient to sea level rise

2022-07-28T13:00:00-04:00

New York’s Battery Park City will soon undergo a series of major resiliency projects that will completely transform the Lower Manhattan coast as the threats of storm surge and sea level rise loom.

Starting in September, after Labor Day, the first phase of the multibillion-dollar Lower Manhattan Coastal Resiliency (LMCR) Project, led by Battery Park City Authority, is set to break ground. Called the South Battery Park City Resiliency Project (SBPCR), the endeavor will see the creation of a continuous flood barrier from the Museum of Jewish Heritage, through Wagner Park, across Pier A Plaza, and along the northern border of the Historic Battery to an elevated point near Bowling Green Plaza.

South Battery Park City Resiliency Project, site plan. Image: Battery Park City Authority

The project is expected to last two years and, when complete, will feature expansive lawns and gardens; education, community, dining, and programming spaces; public restrooms; and universal access. The projec...

Allied Works selected to lead Vero Beach Museum of Art expansion and renovation

2022-06-24T13:45:00-04:00

The Vero Beach Museum of Art (VBMA) has announced the appointment of international design firm Allied Works Architecture to lead the expansion and renovation of the 35-year-old institution. Recognized for its arts and cultural projects, Allied Works will focus on building the museum's resiliency and future growth needs.

Allied Works was chosen following an extensive nine-month search that included a line-up of 13 national architecture firms and an eventual shortlist of four. VBMA worked with architect selection advisor David Meckel to conduct the selection process. The design team will be led by Allied Works founder Brad Cloepfil and Principals Chelsea Grassinger and Gabe Smith.

"We're delighted to have the opportunity to work with everyone at VBMA and bring this project to fruition," said Grassinger.

"Brad, Chelsea, Gabe and their team fully embraced the complexities and opportunities of our project, which involves opening up to a lush park environment while simultaneously buildi...

Considerations when architecting in the WUI

2021-12-20T18:40:00-05:00

If it were me and I was rebuilding in Paradise, which I would happily do, I would be thinking about creating the simplest structure I could, so I don’t have those places of accumulation...not having these weird intersections and roof planes. You know, this is really a complicated look, which is very popular in our modern culture right now, but it’s maybe not setting us up for the best success. I’d also be adding gutter guards of a non combustible material.

Zeke Lunder sat down with Eric Knapp and Yana Valachovic (both members of the California Fire Science Consortium) to talk about their recent paper, which reviews factors that drove structure loss during the 2018 Camp Fire. They also highlight three main priorities for designing or retrofitting buildings for life in the WUI.

New York City announces another round of resiliency pilot programs as de Blasio prepares to step down

2021-11-23T18:17:00-05:00

Outgoing NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio has released a new $90 billion dollar resiliency plan that will expand on an existing pilot program using the city’s own climate-based design guidelines as a precept.

The plan calls for a total of 40 new projects overseen by 23 different capital agencies within a five-year timeframe that will culminate in a strengthened bulwark against the deadly effects of climate change with a particular focus on New York’s oft-neglected “environmental justice areas.”

City entities as diverse as NYCHA and the FDNY will receive between $1 and $3 billion apiece for projects which are the precursors to the soon-to-be-implemented Local Law 41, according to the mayor’s office.

“Climate change is happening now and we have the guide we need to ensure our public infrastructure is protected in New York City,” Bill de Blasio said in a statement. “Roads, hospitals, public housing, and buildings need to be designed with the impact of extreme weather in mind, and the NYC Cl...

'Let’s prepare, act, and survive': UK urged to invest in every area of floodproofing

2021-10-13T13:21:00-04:00

It is a case of “adapt or die”, said the Environment Agency’s chair, Emma Howard Boyd, warning that deadly events such as the flooding in Germany this summer would hit the UK if the country did not make itself resilient to the more violent weather the climate emergency was bringing.

With some big-name resiliency projects planned in Miami and New York for the next few years, the UK now faces a renewed push to invest in its flood-adverse communities before they suffer irreversible damage due to climate change. Sea walls are still a popular infrastructure solution to the crisis, although some say they don’t necessarily offer the best protection owing to their structural inadequacies and corrosive effects on beaches.

England will need about 3.4 billion extra liters of water per day in the future as it faces incredible supply shortages 20 to 25 years in the future. Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the opportunity to answer the crisis a "coming of age" in his speech to the UN General Assembly last month. The government's response will be in the spotlight soon as Glasgow prepares to host the Cop26 summit next month.

Buro Happold has been tapped for an ambitious Twin Cities climate resiliency plan

2021-09-09T16:27:00-04:00

An industry leader in sustainability approaches has once again been selected for a project that will define the Minneapolis-St. Paul region in the 21st century.

Buro Happold has been named the winner of the competitive RFP process for the Metropolitan Council’s Climate Action and Resilience Plan that aims to lay a foundation for regional planning policy for years to come.

The firm has done other significant projects in major cities around the country, including Los Angeles, and Cambridge, MA. A 2017 research project for the C40 organization revealed that an estimated 223,000 lives could be saved if the prescribed actions included in Buro Happold’s report were taken.

Protesters gather outside the statehouse in St. Paul, MN for a demonstration against the Enbridge Line 3 oil pipeline in 2018. Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons user Fibonacci Blue (CC BY 2.0).

“The plan aims to support ongoing mitigation and resilience efforts in the region, including for its most vulnerable communities...

Aluminum wrapping helped one cabin withstand the Caldor Fire

2021-09-09T11:33:00-04:00

Jennifer Diamond, a spokeswoman for the team fighting the Caldor Fire, wasn’t sure who wrapped the Phillips Tract cabin but said she’s helped cover a historic backcountry building with foil in the past. Aside from historic buildings, firefighters might choose to wrap a remote cabin where property owners have already cut back vegetation, cut down overhanging trees and cleared roofs and gutters of debris.

The cabin was among many in the South Lake Tahoe region to adapt a temporary version of an adaptability approach that has become increasingly popular during a year that has already seen over a million acres scorched in California alone.

The ongoing Caldor Fire has destroyed more than 700 homes as of this week and is still only about 50% contained. One problem facing homeowners who attempt the wrapping method is the labor involved: a typical structure takes several people a minimum of five hours to install using an army of 15,000 staples. A 200-foot roll of the material retails for $687.

Hotel workers were among those left to prepare structures for the fire. The San Francisco Chronicle has a look at the wrapping method here.

Miami’s $4 billion plan to combat sea level rise has radical urban ideas

2021-06-01T11:43:00-04:00

The City of Miami has published a draft of its Stormwater Master Plan; a $3.8 billion plan to be enacted over the next 40 years, seeking to mitigate the impact of rising sea levels on the city. The plan sets out a wide portfolio of measures, from stormwater pumps and sea walls to more novel approaches such as floating neighborhoods and streets converted into canals.

The report sets out both short and long-term strategies for the city’s defense from rising sea levels. Near-term resiliency measures, with a 20-to-50-year planning horizon, include both structural and non-structural actions, encompassing everything from infrastructure construction to reformed insurance models. The plan proposes an upgrade to building code strategies, including minimum structure finish-floor levels informed by predicted water surface levels, and a requirement for piled or stilted structures, both buildings and roadways, to consider future sea level rise.

Previously on Archinect: Rising sea levels threa...

Preparing New York City for the next storm

2020-06-29T15:41:00-04:00

June marks the start of hurricane season on the Atlantic Ocean. Even amidst the ravages of a novel coronavirus and state violence, the perils posed by a heating planet are not going away. If the city turned out to be woefully underprepared for a pandemic, what about measures to protect against storms and floods?

Amy Howden-Chapman, co-founder of the climate change and arts platform The Distance Plan, takes a closer look at a variety of climate impact interventions at New York City's most endangered stretches of coastline: from Lower Manhattan and the Lower East Side, Red Hook, Rockaway Boardwalk, all the way to Sunset Cove Park at Jamaica Bay.

"[...] new infrastructures of defense — some military in provenance, some providing a softer transition to higher waters — are already transforming daily life," Howden-Chapman writes in her piece for Urban Omnibus.

Archinect's Virtual Event Guide for the week of June 22-25th

2020-06-22T14:53:00-04:00

Today's featured virtual event happenings, from Archinect's Virtual Event Guide, address issues from resiliency, mass timber, community engagement, residential design, art, public art, urban design, Palm Springs modernism and bamboo.

Are you hosting a virtual lecture? Presentation? Tour? Interview? Happy Hour? Submit it for consideration by clicking here.

Are you an expert in an arena that's especially important right now? Let us know if you would like to work with Archinect to host an online event.

The Future City: Urban Resilience and the Power of Data
Monday, June 22, 2020 7:30 PM BST
Our societies are surrounded by an abundance of data in both the online and physical world. Has data the power to help us understand better our communities and complex reality? Can data help us create new tools to manage urban risk and design resilient cities?
Click here to attend and/or register

Time to reconnect with nature: Timber offices of the future
Tuesday, June 23, 2020 | 12:30 PM – 1:30 PM BST...

Are global investment firms going green?

2020-01-15T18:59:00-05:00

BlackRock, the world's largest asset management firm, has announced that it will use climate risk assessments and environmental sustainability as guiding metrics for how it makes investment decisions moving forward. The impact of this shift could have profound changes for the architecture and construction industries.

The announcement comes from BlackRock CEO Laurence D. Fink via an annual investment forecasting letter sent out to customers at the start of the year. In the letter, Fink writes "Even if only a fraction of the projected impacts [of climate change are] realized, this is a much more structural, long-term crisis. Companies, investors, and governments must prepare for a significant reallocation of capital."

Fink adds, "The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance." And as a result, the firm will seek to prioritize investments in that divorce themselves from fossil fuel industries, provide public transparency to the ...

Rice University researchers prototype diamond-strength building materials from 3-D printed polymer structures

2019-11-26T16:20:00-05:00

How can we make stronger building materials? An experiment conducted by Rice University's Brown School of Engineering explores this limit by manipulating materials like plastic, metal, and concrete to match the strength of diamonds.

Through a series of tests, the team at Rice, led by graduate student Seyed Mohammad Sajadi, discovered that 3D-printed polymers based on tubulane structures could be mimicked and scaled to produce an incredibly durable structure that can both withstand intense compression forces and deflect projectiles. This breakthrough opens new doors for creating impact-resistant materials that perhaps were not possible to create previously.

"Sajadi and his colleagues built computer simulations of various tubulane blocks, printed the designs as macroscale polymers, and subjected them to crushing forces and speeding bullets. The best proved 10 times better at stopping a bullet than a solid ...

Department of Defense plans climate adaptation strategies for military bases

2019-10-28T12:25:00-04:00

The United States Department of Defense (DoD) is studying the ways in which it can update its departmental building standards in order to make military bases and other sites less vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, including the increased frequency and intensity of natural disasters.

During a recent joint hearing of the two House Armed Services Committee subcommittees, Robert H. McMahon, assistant secretary of defense for sustainment, told lawmakers, "As we look out over the last decade or two decades, the challenges and threats we face within our installations have grown dramatically."

McMahon added, "It's climate. It's the challenge we also face with regards to natural disasters, whether that be earthquakes, whether that be forest fires, whether that be deforestation or drought."

The efforts to guard against climate change-induced disasters by the military come as DoD officials work to meet a slew of "emerging threats" to military installations, including minimizing the...

Sea walls: Coming soon to an airport near you

2019-10-11T12:00:00-04:00

Concerned that rising waves will flood runways and buildings in the coming years, officials at San Francisco International Airport are moving ahead with a $587 million plan to build a major new sea wall around the entire airport.

Under the proposed plan, The Mercury News reports, a system of concrete walls and steel plate-supported earthen levees will take shape around the airport's 10-mile perimeter. The walls will be designed to guard against a three-foot sea level rise and five-foot storm surge.

SFO is the nation's seventh busiest airport, while its runways sit roughly 10-feet above current sea level.

City of Seattle tackles housing affordability, workforce automation, seismic upgrades with new "resilience roadmap"

2019-08-30T21:00:00-04:00

We must continue to prepare for acute shocks— events that could threaten our City’s ability to function, such as natural disasters. We must also address chronic stresses—challenges that weaken our natural, built, or human resources, such as income inequality and chronic homelessness. Stresses often exacerbate the effects of shocks when they occur, particularly for vulnerable populations.

The plan comes as Seattle, the fastest-growing city in the country, and the larger Puget Sound metropolitan region around it, prepare to nearly double in population by 2050.

How insurance companies are preparing for increasingly frequent and costly disasters

2019-04-03T14:04:00-04:00

The past two years have been particularly costly for insurance companies that are on the hook for billions of dollars in damage done by hurricanes, wildfires, floods and other disasters. As these disasters become more frequent and expensive, in part because of climate change, insurers are investing more in this research facility that studies how to protect homes and businesses from destructive wind, water and embers.

Opened in 2010, the IBHS Research Center offers full-scale testing of buildings and their materials under the harshest conditions. There, researchers are able to simulate Category 3 hurricanes and replicate wildfires in order to find best practices for mitigating the losses incurred by various natural disasters. Important findings have included a deeper understanding in how to reduce the risks posed by flying embers, and how shutting interior doors can protect homes from avoidable hurricane damage.

Funded by insurance companies, the organization's CEO Roy Wright tells NPR of the increased support for their research. "We've hit an inflection point where we're seeing more events impact more Americans," Wright says. "Our members have increased their investment and said, 'We want more researchers here. We want to see more activity playing out here.' We are collectively responding to this changing world that we're in."

Last year, the Camp a...

BIG's 'Humanhattan 2050' promotes resilient design for NYC waterfront at the Venice Architecture Biennale

2018-06-20T14:40:00-04:00

Lower Manhattan could be the first to test out an innovative system that is being proposed as a way to protect cities from rising sea levels and future storms. Called “Humanhattan 2050,” a visionary idea from Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) that’s on view in the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale, the project not only proposes new infrastructure to safeguard the waterfront for the next hundred years, it will also make these spaces more accessible and enjoyable.

Image via @BIGstertweets/Twitter.

Avid Archinect readers will remember the "Humanhattan 2050" scheme from its initial iteration, BIG's 2014 Rebuild by Design competition-winning proposal "The BIG U" in response to the most devastating storm ever to hit New York, Hurricane Sandy, and the need for resilient, disaster-prepared city planning.

Image via @BIGstertweets/Twitter.

"The 'Humanhattan 2050' exhibit for the Venice Architecture Biennale is a vision that expands upon BIG’s winning idea by enlarging the boundaries of Lower Manhattan with a building development created on an extension of land it cleverly calls MOMA, which is short for MOre MAnhattan," writes Paul Laster for the Observer.

Trump Administration terminates Community Resilience Panel that prepared cities for climate shock

2017-12-05T13:31:00-05:00

The Community Resilience Panel for Buildings and Infrastructure Systems was created by the Obama administration in 2015 within the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology. Its chairman, Jesse Keenan, told members at a meeting Monday that its charter was being dissolved and that meeting would be its last.

The Trump administration is pulling the plug on the Community Resilience Panel for Buildings and Infrastructure Systems—a group created in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy that helped local officials prepare for extreme weather and other natural disasters. The multi-agency organization, comprised of representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, among other federal departments, guided municipal governments and local groups to improve buildings, communications, energy systems and transportation in response to climate threats.

The two-year-old panel was the "federal government's primary external engagement for resilience in the built environment," said the panel's chairman Jesse Keenan. It is yet another federal climate-related body that has been canned by the current administration. Just back in August, the President disbanded a 15-person advisory committee that helped communicate scientific climate change findings to businesses ...

Star-studded design competition seeks to make Bay Area a model for shoreline resiliency

2017-09-13T15:55:00-04:00

San Francisco is one of the many cities in the U.S. threatened by climate change. Scientific projections predict that sea level rise is likely to push tides upwards with accelerating force in the coming decades and a 2012 study estimated that the average high tide within San Francisco Bay could be 66 inches higher by 2100.

Seeking to face the threat of rising sea levels head on, a group of community, industry and government leaders have launched a new competition in the Bay Area that seeks to restore shoreline resiliency, the phrase encompassing techniques that resist rising tides while at the same time providing ecological benefits. Think approaches like planting natural buffers such as eelgrass, which help absorb the shock of storm surges as oceans rise—a challenge that hard structures can't easily meet—while also luring water bugs, fish, birds, and shell reefs that support native oysters.

Ibises, roseate spoonbills, and egrets at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. Found v...

Tampa Bay braces for impact of the storm that might destroy it

2017-09-07T15:12:00-04:00

Tampa Bay is mesmerizing, with 700 miles of shoreline and some of the finest white sand beaches in the nation. But analysts say the metropolitan area is the most vulnerable in the United States to flooding and damage if a major hurricane ever scores a direct hit. A Boston firm that analyzes potential catastrophic damage reported that the region would lose $175 billion in a storm the size of Hurricane Katrina. A World Bank study called Tampa Bay one of the 10 most at-risk areas on the globe.

Published more than a month ago, long before Hurricane Irma was even on anyone's forecast, this piece by Washington Post writer Darryl Fears tells the tale of Tampa Bay as a seeming paradise, with its 4 millions residents, hot real estate market, lofty development ambitions, construction boom — and the big storm that will, maybe, hit one day and put it all in peril.

Now with Irma leaving a trail of destruction in the Northern Caribbean and heading straight for the Florida peninsula, Fears just sat down for an interview with Marketplace host Kai Ryssdal: "[...] the big problem with this hurricane and with Tampa, St. Petersburg, Tampa Bay, is sea level rise. And sea level rise is not a big deal in and of itself because it takes so long to build. But when you add wind, you add surge, that creates a wave, just a wall of water."