Infrastructure planning for sustainable cities

Abstract

Sustainable urban planning frameworks also apply to « critical infrastructures » This article presents a frame-work for better linking the planning of cities and their critical infrastructure so that they will become more sustainable. The first large scale city planning opera-tions in history were infrastructure interventions. They range from the first known water management systems that separated drinking water from waste water in Indus Valley cities five millennia ago to the aqueducts and streets of ancient Rome. More recently, from the infrastructure- led rebuilding of Paris and Barcelona in the 1850s that gave rise to modern city planning; to the highways, high speed rail, airports, and internet of the global city. All city planning was abet-ted by infrastructure. Transitions from one historical era to the next were marked by leaps in city building and infrastructure inventions. Infrastructures enabled cities at a scale and density not possible without them. Infrastructures are so intrinsic to urban life that power, water, transportation, and telecommunications net-works are called « critical infrastructures »