Plans, Projections and Practitioners: Engaging with Communities to Explore Adaptation Strategies for Transportation Infrastructure

Abstract:

Transportation infrastructure is a significant climate change adaptation concern because it is: costly; designed for long operational lives; susceptible to both episodic and seasonal deterioration; and a significant safety concern. While examples of adaptation exist in transportation design, many communities do not have the capacity to incorporate climate change considerations into infrastructure planning and management. This presentation will overview the process and outcomes of research conducted in collaboration with the communities of Prince George and Squamish, both located in British Columbia (BC), Canada. Previous research in Prince George (in northern BC) involved applying downscaled climate projection information to assess local climate impacts, and identified transportation infrastructure as the top priority for ongoing study. In Prince George the adaptation process was oriented toward determining how the City could plan, design, and maintain roads and other structures to account for climate change. A local steering committee was formed, and created and evaluated 23 potential research topics. Two focus areas were selected for further investigation and explored during a workshop with practitioners, researchers, consultants and other representatives. The workshop precipitated additional modelling of projected impacts of climate change on road maintenance and road safety, and plans to explore the viability of alternative paving techniques. Outcomes of the case study provide insights regarding how researchers can ‘combine’ top down and bottom up approaches by using modelling information as part of an engagement process with local experts to explore adaptation. Ongoing research in Squamish seeks to apply lessons learned from the Prince George case study (both related to process and the application of modelling information) to a more temperate coastal region with a more climate-concerned population. In Squamish there also lies an opportunity to explicitly focus on realizing mitigation co-benefits when adapting transportation infrastructure to climate change.