Burnham’s Blog

As part of our Project Drawdown series and our ongoing discussion of urban planning, we’ve explored many of the benefits and challenges facing alternative transportation across the globe. Cycling, and the promotion of biking as a car alternative within and around cities, is a frequent discussion topic: Project Drawdown makes a strong case for bike infrastructure as essential for creating a transportation alternative to emissions-producing modes like private cars. 

Alternative transportation, including bikes, will continue to a play an increasing role in urban planning and design. Prioritizing ease of access, safety, and green solutions to issues in both large-scale planning and individual building design is quickly becoming expected, and designing safe cycling spaces is key to creating a culture that uses bikes as transportation.

Project Drawdown ranks Bike Infrastructure as #59 in solutions to global warming, estimated to reduce 2.31 gigatons of carbon dioxide by 2050 and a savings of $400.47 billion dollars. Better bike infrastructure promotes cleaner air quality and healthier populations and is less expensive to implement than other preventative health measures.

Hong Kong is  truly impressive and much can be learned from this ultra-modern Asian city. It is helpful to sometimes look abroad and consider a different way of approaching issues. The following are some of the factors that make Hong Kong such a unique city and noticeably different from many American urban areas.

Our recent focus on Project Drawdown illustrates an urgently urbanizing world. The world’s cities are growing exponentially, especially in the “global South”, and the United Nations estimates that by 2030, 60 percent of the world’s population will live in cities and one in three people will be living in a city with over half a million people. New populations in the United States (US) are also urbanizing, facing challenges unique to both growing mid-size cities and established urban centers experiencing shifting demographics. 

Urban sprawl is increasing at a rapid pace according to the “Atlas for the End of the World,”a research project by the Department of Landscape Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania. By 2100, three billion more people could be living in cities across the world - requiring the equivalent of 357 cities the size of New York to house them. 

Urban planning that mitigates water loss can reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Though water infrastructure is a vital part of the urban landscape, urban planning often overlooks the environmental impacts of storing and transporting water and the amount of energy used during the process.

Project Drawdown highlights the significant amount of energy used to pump water from sources to treatment plants and then on to storage and distribution. Each year, over 8.6 trillion gallons of water are lost worldwide through leaks in water distribution systems, a number divided equally between low and high-income countries.