- Strategies for Delta Cities and Climate Change, Experiences from the South and the North    319 kb by    Smolders, Bert | bert.smolders@arcadis.nl    Short Outline The paper deals with strategies for climate change and sealevel rise in megacities. How to cope with the conflicting challenges of safety, economic demands, ecology/nature, cultural identity, uncertainty and limitations to public finance. Abstract The focus is on development strategies for mega cities in delta areas. More than half of the world population lives in cities, and the majority of these cities are located near the sea and in delta areas. Delta cities are depending on the relation with the sea, but are also most vulnerable to climate change and sea level rise. The question is how to cope on a long term, with short term action. The problems are even bigger in the growing number of mega cities, in particular in Asia, South America and Africa. Especially the most poorest part of the population is living in flood prone areas. This problem will become even more urgent with seal level rise. As such are climate change, sea level rise and flooding rivers directly linked to the problems of development and the access to affordable housing and urban services in mega cities. Mrs Tibajuka, president of UN-HABITAT and vice-secretary general of the UN, has stressed this problem and has declared it the central theme for UN-HABITAT in 2010. On the World Urban Forum 5 in Rio de Janeiro Un-HABITAT has signed an agreement with ARCADIS consultants on cooperation: the Shelter program. The theme water management and urban planning is part of the cooperation. In the paper strategies are discussed, on how to cope with the conflicting challenges of safety (sea level rise), economic demands (open harbors, resorts facing the sea), ecology/nature, cultural identity, against a backdrop of uncertainty (speed of sea level rise, economic development) and limitations to available public finance. Moreover, they will be compared to our own international experience in large projects on climate change and protection against sealevel rise, such as the Dutch coast, the Belgium coast and the Mississippi delta in New Orleans. Keywords megacity climatechange strategy Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2010: Sustainable City - Developing World   Click to open the full paper as pdf document   Click to send an email to the author(s) of this paper