New Zealand cities face the challenge of major change,3 with increasing uncertainty of how forces such as climate change and global energy shortages will interact and impact urban economies and lifestyles. At the same time urban councils are required to make infrastructure investments and urban development decisions that have long-lasting consequences. One emerging strategy to address uncertain futures is proactively building resilience into urban systems. Resilience thinking focuses down on the question – is it possible to develop urban communities that are inherently more capable of positively responding to rapid endogenous change and shocks? However a holistic set of urban resilience characteristics and measures does not exist to help urban decision-makers assess the resilience of the different urban functions. The purpose of this research is to develop a prototype of an assessment framework for urban decision-makers to evaluate a settlement’s resilience to two significant forces of change; climate change and peak oil.
The paper first explores the potential impacts of climate change and peak oil on New Zealand urban settlements and the rational for policy intervention to address these impacts. The paper then outlines the assumptions and principles that inform the design of the assessment framework. The draft assessment framework is presented and its limitations and options for further development are discussed. The paper concludes with recommendations for the framework’s application and further research and development.
Next section; The impacts of peak oil