Partner: The City of Boulder and Boulder Housing Partners
Group Members: Francis Otero, Brian Chamberlain, Natalie Shishido, Patrick Campbell
The City of Boulder predicts intensified impacts of climate change, including warmer urban heat islands and increasingly severe droughts and floods before 2050. These environmental shifts will have direct impacts on Boulder’s urban infrastructure, ecosystems, human well-being, and economic prosperity. The City of Boulder is taking action to combat these threats through a series of visionary climate mitigation and urban resilience initiatives. The Urban Ecosystems Initiative seeks to address traditional urban landscaping practices which directly contribute to and exacerbate the negative impacts of climate change through heavy water usage, soil degradation, pollinator habitat disruption, and non-native species introduction. In contribution to this initiative, the MENV team will create a strategic framework for urban regenerative landscaping for the City of Boulder. This project includes four main objectives: explore the development of new landscaping standards designed to support carbon sequestration, climate resilience, and other ecosystem services; establish workforce education and training; conduct a market analysis of the landscaping industry; and develop a business plan for landscaping services, both commercial and residential. The team will also participate in the creation of urban landscape management tools, an urban pollinator and biodiversity management plan, and the implementation of effective marketing strategies and youth involvement.
