This article “Inter-dependencies of Urban Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Strategies” discusses a study that analyzed the impacts of climate change and adaptation strategies for infrastructure in the urban city and area of Boston, Massachusetts. The study found that taking precautionary steps before the year 2050 would allow for less adaptation in the future as well as less impact costs in the future. The study emphasized the inter-dependencies of systems involving adaptation and the interrelations among infrastructure systems as well. In addition they stressed the need for the city to develop policies to deal with coming climate change and to easily adapt to these changes so as not to force implementations and new actions quickly. In addition the article discusses a project that was conducted from 1999 to 2004 called CLIMB. A multidisciplinary team conducted the research and included people from Universities in the Northeast and a Stakeholder Advisory Committee, which consisted of members from the government and infrastructure and planning experts. This project essentially looked at existing infrastructure and assessed climate change impacts on that infrastructure and what decision- and policy-makers needed to understand about the potential consequences of climate change. Some of the data and data analysis for this particular study came from the CLIMB project, which was very relevant to this study.
The research topic of this study is analyzing impacts of climate change and developing adaptation strategies for the Boston area while remembering the interconnection of various systems especially the existing infrastructure. This study asked the question; How will climate change potentially impact the existing infrastructure in the Boston, MA immediate area and what are some solutions to this problem? The type of data needed to answer this question is aggregate, interval or ratio data. Most of the data they used were simulations of what may happen in the future along with what preventative measures may be needed as well as scenario data. They mostly examined what may happen with rising temperatures.
The researchers divided the area into seven zones according to three guidelines; areas north of the city of Boston, which have different coastal properties and socioeconomic features, and highly urbanized areas are dealt with separately from suburbs and rapidly growing suburbs are distinguished from already highly developed and densely populated ones. They gathered different data from these different zones and they also took existing data on temperature and precipitation from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change database.
This data was then run through a series of scenarios for climate change impacts compared to current impacts from climate. Each zone was also analyzed by energy use, sea level rise, river flooding, surface vehicle transportation, water supply, public health, water quality, tall buildings, and bridge scour. Effects from future climate change were assessed as well as impacts and three categories of impacts were produced; loss of service: for example, loss of lives due to heat stress, repair/replacement: potential costs for rebuilding infrastructure systems, adaptation: potential cost of correcting the infrastructure.
This research and article was very easy to understand and thorough. It’s also important research that should be done in all cities and communities in order to prepare for the future with potentially different climates.
Kirshen, P., Ruth, M., & Anderson, W. (2008). Interdependencies of Urban Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Strategies: A Case Study of Metropolitan Boston USA. Climatic Change, 86(1-2), 105-122. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10584-007-9252-5