Integrating a Resilience Scorecard and Landscape Performance into a Geodesign Process

Climate change has had observable ecological, social, and economic impacts on the built environment. Wetland loss, increased coastal inundation, and increases in the duration/frequency of flooding can all be attributed to sea level rise. NOAA predicts that mean sea level will rise by 6.29 feet by 2100 in the U.S. Gulf Coast. Adjustments in landscape conditions have been shown to assist in mitigating the effects of flooding and sea level rise.

The Landscape Architecture Foundation has developed tools to quantitatively assess the performance of landscape conditions. Other analytical-planning methods, such as the resilience scorecard (Berke et al, 2015), use quantitative conditional performance measures to reduce losses from hazard events. While these analyses can provide a sound foundation for design decision-making, they remain relatively separate from Geodesign. Using Steinitz’s framework, which specifies six models to be produced within a Geodesign process, the authors integrated the resilience scorecard (as the evaluation model), a vertical buffer tool (as the process model) to project sea level rise, and landscape performance (as an impact model). The process used the resilience scorecard to assess flood vulnerability using projections for the 100 year floodplain with sea level rise by 2100. Projections were used as a guide to spatially execute a resilient master plan for League City. Future impacts of the plan were projected using landscape performance measures. The design projects to decrease the 100-year floodplain area from 76% to 16% and $1.3 billion is generated by life cycle benefits by 2100.

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