Resilient Communities Inspired by Nature

The B-Collaborative's founder Amy Coffman Phillips recently wrote an article on resilient communities inspired by nature for the Great Lakes Bioneers Chicago blog (edit: website no longer functional so article reposted below). Let's start a conversation about local resiliency for our communities by looking to Nature's communities as inspiration.

A lot of attention is being paid to resilience of late. In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, communities across the eastern seaboard and beyond are beginning to plan for disasters associated with climate change or other occurrences beyond our control.

The Rockefeller Foundation, the initiators of the new “100 Resilient Cities Centennial Challenge” define building resilience as “about making people, communities and systems better prepared to withstand catastrophic events – both natural and manmade – and able to bounce back more quickly and emerge stronger from these shocks and stresses.” They see resilience in cities as crucial to the resilience of our global community and they have backed their challenge with funding to provide technical support and resources to select local governments as they plan their urban resilience initiatives.

Chicago and its regional municipalities should explore opportunities to be a part of this initiative. Doing so will leverage our background in cutting-edge sustainability and showcase the need for resilience in America’s heartland.

But why is it so important that our cities embody resilience? And what does it mean to be resilient in the midwest? This is a topic we are exploring in this article and at the Great Lakes Bioneers Conference in Chicago this November 1st through 3rd. Let’s start by having a conversation about and planning for community resilience now, so that we can plan for and address our challenges – before a potential crisis occurs.
The Case for Resilient Cities

Many homeowners realize the need to be prepared and protect their homes from disasters, at varying levels from stockpiling food to purchasing a gas generator. But simply making ourselves more self-sustaining at this micro-scale is a short-term strategy – having enough food and fuel will make little difference if the whole town is on fire. At the other end of the spectrum, the federal government prepares for emergencies through the Federal Emergency Management Agency in affiliation with state agencies, but this macro-level, centralized approach to disaster management is often fraught with inefficiencies and delays.

It is therefore imperative that we address issues of adaptation and resilience at the local level; this middle (meso) scale, from mega-cities like Chicago to its outlying suburbs, large and small, even neighborhoods within a larger community. By embedding resilience into our social, economic and built infrastructure at multiple scales, we can build vibrant, resilient communities that support each other – lessening losses, adapting to changing conditions, and rebounding quicker to save money and lives.
A Resilient Chicago Metropolitan Region

Some may question the need to worry about resilience to the effects of climate change in Chicago when we are located well above sea level and have the largest available freshwater source on the planet in our back yard. It’s true that our location protects us from some of the more severe impacts of climate change and we are in a better position to weather its effects than many coastal communities. But our region is not without its challenges. According to the Chicago Climate Action Plan, it is likely our region will experience:

• Stronger, but infrequent, storms causing wind damage, widespread flooding and/or intermittent drought; 
• Species migrations and extinctions, adversely affecting our local ecology and food production; 
• Dangerous heat waves, resulting in pollution and its health impacts; and 
• Continual draining without recharge of the glacial-remnant Lake Michigan water, leading to lessening availability and pollution of this precious resource. 

The resiliency challenges we face must be planned for and addressed now – prior to them becoming a crisis – in order for our efforts to be effective. Fortunately, we have models we can look to when tackling such seemingly large obstacles. 

Natural Inspiration

In the process of striving to reduce waste and improve the quality of life for our region’s inhabitants, the sustainability movement has prepared us for the resiliency challenge by systematically embedding new and diverse offerings to address the needs of the market. At a systems level, resiliency is born by embedding redundancies and diversities into a system at a variety of scales.

One example of this principle can be seen in alternative transportation options, such as car share and bike share programs along with more robust bicycle infrastructure. By providing alternatives for the daily commute, these market-based programs reduce emissions and fossil fuel use, while at the same time embedding resiliency because they operate at different scales and use different fuel sources.

In this example, if a disturbance affects the electrical grid on a large scale, the electric commuter rail will be affected, but the petroleum fueled cars and caloric body energy fueled bicycles will be able to compensate for this loss and continue to operate through the disturbance. By providing different options to get to work, which work parallel to but operate differently than the existing options, we embed resilience into our communities and their vital infrastructure.

This deep principle of cross-scale embedded redundancy and diversity draws inspiration from nature’s naturally resilient ecosystems. For example, in our native tallgrass prairie, there are many different types of grasses that accomplish the function of photosynthesis. They operate without inefficiencies because they are different from each other in significant ways, such as how much water they need or what temperatures they are able to photosynthesize. These characteristics allow them to respond differently to changing environmental conditions and capture resources at different times. In wetter seasons, or in different microclimates, different types of grass may be dominant versus in dryer seasons, but the systemic function of photosynthesis remains.

Translating the principles found in nature to a human context is the practice of biomimicry. When viewing nature from a systems perspective, we are able to recognize that human systems are a part of natural systems, subject to the same constraints and abundances as the rest of life. By looking at other complex, adaptive systems for inspiration, we are able to translate their lessons into our own context so that we can embed locally-attuned, context specific resiliency strategies for our region. 

Start a Conversation

We think of the Bioneers movement and our upcoming conference as a bridge between sustainability and natural inspiration, providing thought provoking conversation and useful tools to address the challenges we face in our communities. This topic will be explored in detail at the “Community Resilience” session on Friday, November 1st and the “Community Resilience Inspired by Nature” workshop on Sunday, November 3rd.

And we want to hear from you - how do you think we embody resilience in our communities? And how can we as Bioneers add value to this conversation by looking to sources of natural inspiration? Let’s work together to embed resilience into our local communities prior to disturbance, so that our communities are able to not only survive but thrive through adversity. 

About the Author

Amy Coffman Phillips is an architect, MBA, and Certified Biomimicry Professional. She founded The B-Collaborative, an education and design consultancy, to catalyze and facilitate naturally-inspired sustainable design projects. Their flagship product is the "Naturally Resilient" workshop for business and non-profit leaders looking to embed Nature’s resilience strategies into their strategic planning initiatives. She is also a partner and adult educator at Prairie Lab, LLC, a professional development firm, and is co-founder of Biomimicry Chicago, a local resource for naturally inspired sustainable design.
Sources

“100 Resilient Cities Centennial Challenge”

Great Lakes Bioneers Conference

Chicago Climate Action Plan

Biomimicry’s Life’s Principles

BEND’s “Naturally Resilient" Workshop

AskNature