Exclusive Urban planning for urban (Only urban) development is basic cause of socio-economic, cultural and Ecological imbalance. Regional planning is the way out. Regional planning should be with following steps:

1. Carve a geographical area having similar socio-economic, geological and climatic situations. The resources in the area would also be similar.

2. Identify this area as "A Region" The regional resources should be further identified as "Local resources" (Dist. level)

3. On the basis of regional and local resources a balance development plan should be worked out to see that regional resource are sustainably used.

4. The centers of development should not have a large difference. Industrial development, Opportunities of education, employment, health facilities etc. should be well distributed and not concentrated around One or two cities.

5. With this balanced socio-economic planning regional and among region eco-balance would automatically achieved after a little longer duration till then we must haave patience.

Unbalanced urban concentrated development is the result of impatience.

Great answer Mukund! Thanks. From your answer, it seems Regional planning has more potential of meeting the challenges of climate changes than Urban planning. For the latter, would it be right to be specific about some issues such as employing the 'Green-belt' concept in a Master plan for a congested city?

Christy Nwachi: "The present global problems emanating from climate changes have been a source of worry to World Leaders."

Why are You so sure of this?

Green "SPOTS" would be better than "BELT"

Some one needs to start a serious discussion about cost-benefit associated with government-scale projects that will need to be undertaken to maintain something akin to the status quo. I wouldn't count on elected officials to start that discussion; they aren't afforded the luxury of thinking down the road 5, 10, or 50 years. That's where planners might be most helpful. I believe it will be urban and regional planners who will need to have the crucial projects identified and shovel ready before politicians take action. What I'd like to see happen is for planners to make sure all data needed to justify a project are being collected, and where shortfalls exist, fill them. I think that a large part of the populace would be willing volunteers to collect any data that is needed.

In addition to socio-cultural-economical data we would need to have geo-geographical-climatic data, data on resources above and beloww ground. GIS techniques should be encouraged more and more. The data will have to shared. At many places this is being done less by govt, more by planners. The planners are showing way. Even then politicians do not implement them to safe guard their selfish motives. Yet, we must go ahead.

Mukund and Daniel, thanks so much for the very useful inputs. To Zsolt, I would say that you've opened an important facet of this discussion. World Leaders being worried about climate change does not necessarily imply that they are taking decisive steps towards solving the problem. In recent years, several World Summits has taken place with challenges of climate changes forming some of the major discussions.

Unfortunately, there are no corresponding action to match the resolutions.

Local governments are becoming very active in planning for climate change, including reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and reducing vulnerability to potential impacts of climate change (changing probabilities and risks of extreme events such as floods). One organization that is promoting networking among researchers and practitioners is ICLEI; http://www.iclei.org/.

Thanks a lot Stewart.

Climate change, seemingly, is linked to creation of impervious surfaces, when it comes to planning. It is emerging that mixed land use and vertical expansion leave a smaller ecological footprint than horizontal expansion. How can this be corelated to urban planning vis a vis regional planning?

I was excited by your response Priya. You have opened up another dimension of the problem and I am waiting anxiously for contributions. If I may add, I would suggest that vertical expansion requires a well developed technological system which is eluding most third world countries.

Urban planning can contribute to climate change initiatives by reducing carbon emissions from transport-related energy consumption.

URBAN TRANSPORTATION AND CLIMATE CHANGE - The transportation sector is currently the second largest generator of carbon emissions behind livestock consumption processes. Approximately half of the world's population currently live in urban areas and is anticipated to increase to 70% in the medium-term future. Within the transportation sector, almost 80% of emmissions are from road transportation (http://www.ecoissues.ca/index.php/GHG12_Transportation).

In short, reducing vehicle use in urban areas can have a significant impact on global carbon emissions. Planning cities that foster more walking, cycling, and transit use (over car use) for daily trips will have a huge impact.

URBAN DENSITY - Setting up a zoning policy framework for compact, mixed-use, urban environments has demonstrated to have substantial impact on reducing vehicle use in cities. One of the basic measures to back this argument is the urban land use density vs transportation energy use (http://globalizationstudies.sas.upenn.edu/node/737?size=_original). If you were to examine urban density information and compare vehicle usage statistics across the world, you will notice that the more dense a city is, the less vehicle usage. Many municipalities have recognized this and implemented policies to help implement urban form that reduces auto-use. There are very low density cities that have 85-90% of all trips conducted by car. Yet, in more compact cities, you will see vastly lower car mode shares. Hong Kong for example has a 5% car trip share, Vienna - 31%, Vancouver - 58%, Munich - 41%, etc.. Transit is of course an important element of this, however density (i.e. proximity to transit) plays the largest role in making those systems supportable. Getting transit to work means getting people within walking / biking distance of transit. To do this, you need density!

____Justin

Justin, you have substantiated what i initiated quite explicitly. I fully agree with your argument in favor of high density, high transit supported living. yet, we need to check for any correlation between high density living and quality of life.

Brilliant, Justin. I find your response quite interesting but I think the challenges of high density development lies in creating a balance between INTENSITY of infrastructural use and living quality (Priya). Thanks to you Justin and Priya because I intend to explore this area of Urban research.

The concept of "urban metabolism," explained nicely here http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/156804/ is useful for understanding approaches urban planners might take to reduce the flows of materials, and in particular energy, so as to reduce a city's carbon footprint.

I agree with Justin, its absolutely right that the transportation sector contributes significantly towards Green House Gas (GHG) emissions which are contributing factors for the global climate change. In developing countries, the share of urban transportation sector in overall vehicular emissions is significant. Therefore, there is a dire need for increasing public transportation patronage as an instrument for reducing traffic congestion and vehicular emissions which may mitigate global climate change to some extent.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=In+what+specific+ways+can+Urban+%26+Regional+Planning+contribute+positively+to+the+present+global+challenges+of+climate+changes%3F

Then try Scholar!

Justin,

I fear that in using Newman and Kenworthy's well worn scatter diagram of transport energy use against metropolitan density, Justin is falling into an old (but seductive) trap. There are two fundamental problems with using this as evidence that compact cities can make a major difference to energy use.

One (relevant anywhere) is that this simple plot (ignoring other causal influences) greatly overstates the extent to which density variations actually impact on energy use/emissions - by a factor of about 3. As Echenique et al say (in the most recent of the critiques,):

'A basic premise behind the prescription for higher density was an assumed relationship between density and fuel consumption proposed by Newman and Kenworthy (1989), who concluded that high-density cities consume less energy. This relationship has been discredited as the causality cannot be attributed solely to density determining fuel consumption; it has been demonstrated that density plays a small part in energy consumption if the price of fuel and other automobile travel costs, relative to income, is included in the analysis (I. Gordon, 1997). A more plausible causal explanation is that in those cities that have cheap travel, people tend to travel further in order to have more living space, as prices are lower outside

central areas. Thus, transport cost is the cause of density rather than density being the cause of lower fuel consumption'. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2012.666731

The other problem (especially relevant in already urbanised countries) is that only the density of increments to the building stock (about 1% p.a. in the UK case) can be compacted, making this far too slow an instrument to achieve the kinds of reduction in emissions that are now required. By contrast, the obstacles to raising gasoline taxes to levels that would achieve much more radical reductions, are ones of political will only, not technical possibility.

Versions of the arguments and evidence may be found here:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258218069_Can_planning_for_a_more_compact_city_secure_sustainable_levels_of_urban_travel_in_the_London_region_1?ev=prf_pub ;

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258723618_Densities_Urban_Form_and_Travel_Behaviour_%28published_in_Town_and_Country_Planning_66_1997_239-241%29/file/60b7d528deba279296.doc?origin=publication_detail; and

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222933551_Density_and_the_built_environment

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