From the Ground Up: Local Efforts to Create Resilient Cities

by Alison Sant

For decades, American cities have experimented with ways to remake themselves in response to climate change. These efforts, often driven by grassroots activism, offer valuable lessons for transforming the places we live. In  From the Ground Local Efforts to Create Resilient Cities , design expert Alison Sant focuses on the unique ways in which US cities are working to mitigate and adapt to climate change while creating equitable and livable communities. She shows how, from the ground up, we are raising the bar to make cities places in which we don’t just survive, but where all people have the opportunity to thrive.

The efforts discussed in the book demonstrate how urban experimentation and community-based development are informing long-term solutions.  Sant shows how US cities are reclaiming their streets from cars, restoring watersheds, growing forests, and adapting shorelines to improve people’s lives while addressing our changing climate. The best examples of this work bring together the energy of community activists, the organization of advocacy groups, the power of city government, and the reach of federal environmental policy.

Sant presents 12 case studies, drawn from research and over 90 interviews with people who are working in these communities to make a difference. For example, advocacy groups in Washington, DC are expanding the urban tree canopy and offering job training in the growing sector of urban forestry. In New York, transit agencies are working to make streets safer for cyclists and pedestrians while shortening commutes. In San Francisco, community activists are creating shoreline parks while addressing historic environmental injustice.

From the Ground Up  is a call to action. When we make the places we live more climate resilient, we need to acknowledge and address the history of social and racial injustice. Advocates, non-profit organizations, community-based groups, and government officials will find examples of how to build alliances to support and embolden this vision together. Together we can build cities that will be resilient to the challenges ahead.
 

Genres: Urban Planning, Urbanism, Nonfiction, Politics, Philosophy, Environment

304 pages, Paperback

Published January 11, 2022

Reviews

[A. Ghigo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pivotal book on contemporary city-making.

If you are interested in the present and future of urban development you’ll find this book absolutely indispensable. No book before has so thoroughly and insightfully tackled the recent history of the emergent people-led practices that are reshaping US cities "from the ground up.” In an age of unprecedented environmental challenges and crippling disinvestment in the res publica, the author shows how citizens, activists, and practitioners are coming together to build a movement that is making the difference in our fight for the right to the city and climate justice. Sant’s research explores many urban realities (San Francisco, Minneapolis, New York, New Orleans, Portland, and Philadelphia) illuminating the root causes of pressing challenges as well as the impact of community action in confronting those challenges. Rather than asserting the arguments with her voice alone, Sant elevates a multitude of voices, creating a powerful collective testimony. The research behind the text draws from interviews of a more than 90-person strong cohort of thinkers and doers, making the story even more vivid and compelling. Yet the book is not simply a testimony— it is more than anything a galvanizing call-to-action demonstrating the agency of our collective efforts in bringing about the change we want to see in our cities.

Ghigo DiTommaso

[Marina McDougall · Rating 5 out of 5]

We have long needed a collective vision of how climate resilient cities can also be more vibrant and convivial places to live.

From the Ground Up provides this vision, inspiring our cultural imagination with a vivid series of case studies. Years of dedicated research including extensive interviews with activists, organizers, educators, policy makers and designers from across the country are thoughtfully presented in a compendium of leading urban projects.

With this pragmatic toolkit, Sant shakes us out of our complacency, awakening us to the breadth of possibilities latent in our everyday environments. The interdisciplinary approach that she models — a meld of civic process, science, policy, design, and invention — will encourage us to build more ecologically attuned, socially just, aesthetically pleasurable, and culturally vibrant living environments.

This much anticipated book surpasses all expectations. With a sage introduction by Eric Sanderson and compelling illustrations by Packard Jennings, Sant has orchestrated an engaging urban colloquium. This is a dynamic conversation that you can put in your bookbag and read in the park. When you’re done, you’ll be inspired to grab a shovel, befriend some oysters, and approach the movement afresh!

[Alex Carlson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Key takeaways:
- engage ALL communities that may be affected by a given policy change. E.g. the bikeways example in Minnesota - need to enable/support/educate especially marginalized communities to be incorporated and benefit from the change. Otherwise, they may reject even changes that benefit them.
- full-scale public policy change can start with small grass-roots progress (e.g. SF parklets program and tenderloin)
- we've done many things as we've modernized and developed cities that seriously subvert natural processes and create major risks -- e.g. working around and against water in New Orleans or the way that we've suppressed and mitigated all wildfire risk for years leading to overgrowth of brush and larger, more explosive wildfires when they occur these days

[Fay A. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written during the pandemic, the harrowing Trump presidency, and global protests in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, the author, San Francisco based Alison Sant, interviewed 90 people to incisively profile 9 U.S. cities as urgent calls to action to reverse climate change. She argues as we witnessed during these past two years, we can change the world in an instant. This book shows us that there are activists, designers and government officials among others who have been doing just that - all we need to do is pay attention and act.

– Fay Darmawi, Executive Director, SF Urban Film Fest

[Lucia M · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great reminder that everyone is trying in every corner to make cool shit happen. Good to see some familiar names and some new names in this collection. Super inspiring.