Making Sense of the Urban Nexus // An Integrated Approach to Intersecting Challenges
By Giulia Salvaterra and Michael Woodbridge. Cities are sites of complex and intersecting challenges which threaten the success of the global sustainable development agenda. All over the world, cities face persistent challenges related to increasing climate- and weather-related impacts, insufficient infrastructure, sustained poverty and inequality, resource scarcity, and sustainable service provision. Finding solutions to these challenges will be made even more difficult by growth and migratory flows between cities, both of which are forecast to increase significantly for the global urban population over the next three decades. As the total number of urban dwellers increases, greater demand will be placed on peri-urban and rural land – both for productive activities and for human settlements.