Day 5 (April 1) - A resilience plan that's a resilient plan. 

To develop a plan that increases the resilience of Seattle in the face of climate change, we also need to consider what will make the plan itself resilient. 

What makes our plans unresilient, sitting on the shelf and gathering dust? Two things come to mind based on our tour of projects that were developed from Copenhagen's cloud burst plan. First is changes in leadership or priorities and second is bad timing. 

In Seattle, like many other cities, what could be seen as a high priority for funding and resources at one time, or during one administration can slip down the list when those priorities change. What happens to a plan that focuses on regulatory compliance when the regulations change? What happens to a plan focused on one type of benefit when our politicians or communities stop valuing that benefit? 

The authors of Copenhagen cloudburst plan say that the best way to create a plan with political resilience is to develop an airtight business case showing that the plan delivers the greatest benefit for the lowest cost. The business case for the Copenhagen cloudburst plan had its basis in avoided costs. They used modeling as well as real data on damages from previous flood events to develop a base case that clearly laid out the (very large) cost of inaction. Then they compared the cost of two alternative approaches to avoid those future costs through infrastructure investment. Even without monetizing the other co-benefits, they found the integrated water management, or 'green' infrastructure alternative to be less expensive than the 'grey' infrastructure approach. Both alternatives proved to be less expensive in the long run than the cost of doing nothing. When Copenhagen's political environment shifts, the cloudburst plan presents each new administration with an irrefutable strategy, one that is easy for them to support. 

Of course as a city leader, being able to conceptually support a plan (thanks to a strong business case) doesn't always mean that you'll also get support from your community needed to fund implementation. In this regard, the cloudburst plan took advantage of timing. 

Copenhagen first started cloudburst planning after a particularly damaging cloudburst storm. They started with a framework and overall business case, as well as prioritizing areas to start more detailed planning and design. Then, they experienced another cloudburst storm. With the plan on-hand, they got the green light to develop the first set of cloudburst managent projects. Those projects are now complete, making up our itinerary over the last few days. 

Ulrick, our tour guide in Kokkedal mentioned that they have not experienced a cloudburst since then and have started to see the funding for future projects dry up, just like the weather. However, next time they have a big storm, they will have their plan ready to take advantage of the following 6 months when everyone wants to see action. 

While I hope that in Seattle we will have the foresight to build resilience before disaster strikes, I also see the importance of having a plan on hand that helps our community and leaders turn a disaster into an opportunity. A plan that has proven to be a cost effective approach to improving resilience and avoiding future costs, one that can weather shifting priorities and provide a roadmap in a time of crisis, is a resilient plan. 
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Tilting at Windmills...except the ones here are the original pump stations.

It stung. She leaned in and took another one on the chin. “Green veneer, x*#x!” Sigh. Always a struggle. It was exhausting.

Why did green infrastructure conversations seemingly end with concerns about added cost and exacting performance standards? What about avoided cost? Whole systems? Ecosystem services?

Climate change isn’t going to wait. How then, can we? We learned with Windermere that weather and with it the target condition changed. With that dynamic, should we rely solely on solutions that are cast in concrete?

Even Don Quixote gave pause in the charge.

What is the problem we are solving for? What are our community’s broadest aspirations and values? Is it to meet the narrow yoke of inflexible regulation and spend money in invisible ways? Or would the ask be to integrate and align with as many community values as possible...to be more creative?

Ironically, being creative may not mean new. In fact, innovation probably finds precedence in some of the oldest systems on earth...nature. To innovate, we need to be aware of older forms (old Venetian water plazas) and newer forms (Rotterdam’s Bentham water square) and the true stories and data from both their successes and failures.

Then, we need to charge forward with a balanced “no regrets” portfolio that blends the proven alongside continued investments in practice.  Since 1270, the civil engineers in Rotterdam have been living with water in a country that is now 1/3 below sea level.  They've had plenty of practice, plenty of success and plenty of failures.  Their advice for us today:  1) invest in a large scale in small scale solutions; and 2) build with nature...use ecosystem services.