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Live Q&A: How could Mexico City be stronger and more resilient? Q&A: How could Mexico City be stronger and more resilient?
(3 days later)
To kick off our Mexico City live week, we will be talking to Arnoldo Matus Kramer, the man tasked with the not-insignificant challenge of trying to bring the city’s officials, experts and residents together to plan how to make the city stronger – addressing everything from social inequality to earthquakes and flooding. To kick off our Mexico City live week, we talked to Arnoldo Matus Kramer, the man tasked with the not-insignificant challenge of trying to bring the city’s officials, experts and residents together to plan how to make the city stronger – addressing everything from social inequality to earthquakes and flooding.
Having worked for almost a decade in a diverse array of climate change policy positions, Arnoldo took up the role of Mexico City’s Chief Resilience Officer in 2014. He will play a leading role in this week’s second annual Chief Resilience Officer summit.Having worked for almost a decade in a diverse array of climate change policy positions, Arnoldo took up the role of Mexico City’s Chief Resilience Officer in 2014. He will play a leading role in this week’s second annual Chief Resilience Officer summit.
What are Mexico City’s greatest strengths right now – and what are the problems it most urgently needs to address? How do you think the city could become stronger, and what would you like to see at the top of Arnoldo’s priority list? You shared your thoughts and questions for Arnoldo about some of the city’s biggest challenges and how DF could become stronger – and in a live Q&A on Monday 9 November, we sat down with Arnoldo to hear his responses.
Post your questions for him now in the comments below, or tweet us @guardiancities or using #GuardianMexico. We wanted to kick off the discussion by asking: What are the biggest existing strengths of Mexico City and what do you feel are DF’s greatest resilience challenges at the moment?
The live Q&A will take place on Monday 9 November, 8-8.30am CST (2-2.30pm GMT). Its greatest strength is that we have faced multiple risks and we learned from them. For example, in 1985 a very large earthquake put the city to a limit, and the authorities were overcome by the size of the disaster – and the response of civil society was very active, and that created a moment of change in terms of creating resilience at a societal level. This started a transition to more democracy and a more active civil society in Mexico. Since 1985, the government has built a national civil protection system so people know what they have to do in case there’s a disaster. You can see the difference with last hurricane in Mexico – Patricia – there were no fatalities even if it was the strongest one in the Pacific.
In terms of challenges, there are many long-term planning issues that are strong risks for the city and metropolitan area, for example water-related risks. We are facing a time in which there’s a constant degradation of local and regional aquifers, which in 20 to 30 years could affect the supply of water to the city. The other challenge is mobility – the average commuting rate for any citizen is 3 hours per day, and speed is decreasing because we have a higher population of cars. Last but not least, social inequalities also impact how we cope with disasters. (Arnoldo)
Scotduke says “I think better transportation is crucial. The road system is pretty much gridlocked at peak periods. Somehow the city is going to have to build more rail and tram links.”
ungainlyhoik also adds “I would like to ask why Mexico City is investing so much money in road infrastructure (Supervía, second floors, new Chapultepec, sorting out the Churubusco/Insurgentes/Circuito mess) when that does not benefit the majority of the population or solve capacity issues and are there any plans to expand the inadequate public transport – especially the metro?”
In 2014, the law on mobility changed – now the priority in terms of mobility puts pedestrians at the top of the pyramid, then cyclists, public transport and then cars. This is a change of paradigm that just passed last year. From regulation to investment, we’re now in a transition. You can’t, for sure, say that investing in car infrastructure in Mexico City is resilient. But it’s a transition because we have an embedded systm for investment from decades ago and now we need to act on the change. We started Vision Zero to reduce fatalities – so that will create a change in the urban environment – identifying conflictive roads, for instance.
It’s a big challenge, a big financial one. The city is investing in the metrobus system (our BRT network has gone from 0 lines to 6 lines in 12 years) – and Mexico City will soon become the city with the largest BRT system in the world. And the metro is expanding as well. (Arnoldo)
Carlota asks via Whatsapp: “I think parks and open green spaces have a strong link with people being able to relax and recharge. More and more parks have been replaced with supermarkets and malls. Are there any plans to create more parks in Mexico City?”
One of the major potential projects is related to the destiny of the current airport. That’s a place where we could have a very big park. It’s 740 hectares – even if we have 50-60% as a park, it would do a lot for that eastern part of the city which is really lacking green spaces. There’s an issue as well in terms of the fact that the city is still growing. One critical factor is that if it expands outwards, it grows in the conservation areas, which is affecting the areas of recharge of the aquifer which are key for the city. But there’s a need for more popular housing. So a big challenge is how to respond to these housing demands and provide green spaces. (Arnoldo)
@guardiancities Which is #GuardianMexico City strategy to be more resilient to social and health inequalities?
In terms of social inequality, there are large investments to reduce it, but that’s not enough. One critical issue in terms of health is working with the public space – improving it to have healthier lives, so that people can exercise, walk, cycle in a free environment. (Arnoldo)
Steph (@lajimenezmx) asks: “Which has been the biggest challenge for mainstreaming disaster risk reduction to all government beside environmental officials?”
There is a lot of work in that area. You can never stop learning and improving. Climate change poses a lot of challenges. One challenge is to mainstream adaptation to climate change into different sectors – for example, extreme rain events which can cause floods are not linked to historical records. So working out how to prepare institutions for extreme and unexpected natural events is a challenge. (Arnoldo)
Leading DF architect Jose Castillo asks: “Given the fact that resiliency is an issue that requires complex inter-institutional coordination and response, how do you envision changes in the way local government agencies work together to face such a serious challenge, both within local CDMX ministries as well as with federal and State of Mexico agencies?”
We are working with an institution called CAME (the commission for the environment for the megalopolis) – with them we are building a score card to have a baseline on resilience at the megalopolis level, which will create an agenda for resilience, with priorities. Challenges we face in common at regional level are: to work on mobility, water management and protection of natural and biodiversity resources. (Arnoldo)
Dulce Colín, director of communication at TECHO México, asks via Whatsapp: “A resilient city is one where the population has access to rights such as housing (in the terms defined by the United Nations). How is your resilience plan linked to this particular right? Are there any measures in place towards the improvement of irregular settlements in the city, with the possibility for them to get regulated?”
We are working with the ministry of housing and development to provide a resilience lens to the program of urban development, which is currently in development. It will address key issues related to access to housing for vulnerable communities. In terms of illegal settlements, one critical factor is not to allow increasing illegal settlements in risky areas. and a priority for the resilience office will be to start working to address this. There are two type of actions: you can try to mitigate the risk for those communities through different actions; and a second which is more complex is if there is very high risks for them, you need to have a programme to relocate those communities.