The Resilient Metropolis: Planning in an Era of Decentralization

This thematic issue of Urban Planning focuses on recent transformations of the built environment, the economy, and society around the world. The articles examine how planning processes and policy responses can adapt to the transformation of metropolitan areas in the pursuit of a more just and resilient society. Key themes are centered on socio‐spatial processes that drive the uneven growth, the economic globalization of cities and the pursuant human migration, and the impact of the Covid‐19 pandemic. Collectively, the authors engage in a scholarly conversation about the future of the resilient metropolis in an era of decentralization. © 2022 by the author(s);licensee Cogitatio (Lisbon, Portugal).

Urban Crises and the Covid-19 Pandemic: An Analytical Framework for Metropolitan Resiliency

Social scientists of the urban condition have long been interested in the causes and consequences of the phenomena that shape the growth and decline of cities and their suburbs. Such interests have become increasingly relevant in light of the Covid-19 pandemic. Over the course of the pandemic, many academic and popular analyses have confronted two essential questions: How has the pandemic changed the city? And given these changes, are they permanent? This current scholarly and popular dialogue generally lacks comparative analysis. In this article, we attempt to further the analysis and discussion about the pandemic and the city by refraining the debate through three comparative lenses: temporal, scalar, and dimensional. Drawing on the debate and experience of urban areas in the United States, we present an analytical framework to apply a comparative analytical approach. Three temporal analytical matrices are presented: (a) pre-pandemic, (b) current-pandemic, and (c) post-pandemic. These matrices articulate the relationships between a city's developmental patterns and their related dimensions of urbanization. We pay special attention to the nature of scale within and among the cities and suburbs of regions. Each matrix is tested and contextualized using relevant narratives from cities in the United States before, during, and after the pandemic on various issues, including housing, transportation, and economic development. This framework will serve as an analytical tool for future research on the pandemic and how cities can become more resilient to such shocks.