GRAND CHALLENGES: Highlighting our Partners

Challenge 1: Abundant Biodiversity

“To embrace the ethical obligation to promote native species diversity for the sake of humans and nonhumans alike; To reverse wherever possible losses in species biodiversity, native habitat, and ecological connectivity; To envision cities as arks where biodiversity can co-exist, regenerate and even flourish with urban density.”

City of Los Angeles

The City of Los Angeles continues to monitor the LA Biodiversity Index and expects to publish a monitoring report later this year that will show how biodiversity has changed since the adoption of the index. Additionally, the city is in the process of creating a formal biodiversity action plan to outline the city’s strategy to improve the Biodiversity Index’s score.

Birmingham, UK

Through its A to Bee roads program, the city has improved pollinator habitat along 100 Km of road verges to support linear habitat connectivity.

San Francisco

In a historic reintroduction that further restores native ecosystems in San Francisco, the California Academy of Sciences and Presidio Trust released Silvery Blue butterflies (Glaucopsyche lygdamus)—the closest living relative of the extinct Xerces Blue butterfly (G. xerces)—in the sand dunes of the Presidio.

Toronto

The city relaunched Lights Out Toronto, a public awareness campaign to reduce migratory bird deaths by encouraging residents and businesses to turn off unnecessary lights during migratory season. Toronto was also re-certified as a Bird Friendly City under Nature Canada's Bird Friendly City Certification Program.

Vitoria-Gasteiz

The city is in the process of developing a new Biodiversity Strategy for 2024-2034, which will diagnose the current situation of biodiversity conservation at the municipal level. Clear and achievable objectives will be established, in line with current environmental regulations and policies, and strategic actions to meet them and achieve significant progress in the protection of its biodiversity over the next decade.

Challenge 2: Creating a Movement

“To create and support the capacity of a generative social impact network that includes public and private partners to implement the concepts of biophilic planning and design in the form of adopted policy and practice.”

San Francisco

The California Academy of Sciences led Reimagining San Francisco alliance continues to grow. With more than 50 governmental and NGO partners, a full-time coordinator has been hired to facilitate the collaboration’s desired outcomes and overarching goals to improve the ecological health of San Francisco and equitably distribute the benefits of local nature to all.

Wellington

Wellington has received a special mention from the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize for its “exemplary commitment towards living with nature.” The award announcement specifically identified that Wellington is a city that “stands out for its steadfast dedication to conserving and restoring natural habitat in both urban and natural areas through innovative programmes.” Noted accomplishments within the city include the Zealandia Ecosanctuary, the Predator Free Wellington project, and the Makara Peak Bike Park.

Norfolk

The city is moving into Phase 2 of community engagement to collaboratively develop a new comprehensive plan for Norfolk (NFK2050). Biophilia is a central element of the future vision for the city and is represented in one of the four pillars for the plan – “Embracing Nature.”

Kansas City

In the fall of 2024, the city participated in the Center for Regenerative Solutions Green Infrastructure Urban Nature-based Climate Solutions Accelerator.

Toronto

In partnership with a local non-profit organization, Park People, through the InTO the Ravines program, provided leadership training for twenty (20) local InTO the Ravines Champions who hosted eight (8) events across the city and gave $15,000 in microgrants to ten (10) Changemakers with priority to equity-deserving park groups or small non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to deliver a signature park event and to build their capacity to continue their work to advocate for their local ravine spaces and for those that have not visited these natural areas previously to experience nature.

Challenge 3: Ecological Wonder

“To invite appreciation of the intangible qualities of nature across the urban landscape through education, art and experiences that inspire a sense of awe, a connection to the larger world, and a stewardship responsibility.”

Pittsburgh

The City of Pittsburgh has been selected as one of 19 U.S. Nature Everywhere Communities by The Children & Nature Network, the National League of Cities, and KABOOM!. The Nature Everywhere Initiative aims to increase equitable access to a healthy, natural world by working to reduce disparities in housing, employment, food, health, and education. Nature Everywhere Communities will receive two years of strategic planning, technical support, and start-up funding to develop and implement community-driven plans for connecting children and families to nature-based experiences and learning.

Phipps

BCN partner the Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens held its ninth annual BioBlitz in June to identify as many of its living neighbors as possible in a 24-hour period. Some of this year’s highlights included a bat night hike and botanical illustration classes. The full list of species identified this year can be found on the #bioPGH blog.

Miami-Dade County

Biscayne Bay Friendly is a multimedia multilingual campaign developed by the city to educate residents, tourists, and students on how their actions impact the Bay.

Reston

Conducted over 5 natural resources inventories (dragon flies, butterflies, bird watches, stream macroinvertebrate sampling, citizen science salt watch for water quality programs) that both educated and gave us long-term data sets.

Challenge 4: Equitable Access to Nature

“To ensure that nature is equitably accessible for all citizens across the urban landscape by bridging both physical and psychological barriers; to increase access in communities where access to nature has historically been the most limited and where increased access to nature can have the greatest impact.”

Birmingham, UK

Birmingham has been on a journey to tackle inequitable access the city's communities face when it comes to parks and green spaces. The city has developed the Environmental Justice Index to help guide the use of the city’s resources directed at improving the amount and quality of green space in areas in most need. Learn more through this webinar and paper.

Phipps

In November, KultureCity®, a leading nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting inclusivity and accessibility for individuals with sensory needs, proudly announces the achievement of Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens for its commitment to creating sensory-inclusive spaces.

Raleigh

The Raleigh Parks Nature Preserves and Programs Team increased access and inclusion of their natural areas and programs by evaluating, identifying, planning, and implementing opportunities for their spaces to be more gender and culturally inclusive. Outcomes under this effort included translation of selected materials into non-English languages, hosting events that helped amplify the voices, stories, and histories of underrepresented communities, and partnering on programming for safe birding practices with Outdoor Afro, the Raleigh LGBTQIA+ Center, Field Inclusive, and the Wake County Audubon Society Chapter.

Toronto

Launched the Toronto Tree Equity Score Analyzer (TESA), a public and free online tool, developed through a partnership with non-profit organizations American Forests and Local Enhancement and Appreciation of Forests (LEAF). The TESA tool allows users to explore Toronto’s tree equity data and plan new opportunities to help improve tree equity in Toronto at the neighborhood-level by developing tree planting scenarios.

Challenge 5: Flourishing Health and Wellbeing

“To build consensus that daily contact with nature is an essential element of positive health and wellbeing, longevity, and quality of life; to support documentation that enabling engagement with nature is a cost-effective investment in preventative health.”

Arlington

The county is undertaking a study of natural surface recreational trails to improve sustainability and better connect more people to nature, a conservation effort recommended by the county’s Forest and Natural Resources Plan.

San Francisco

San Francisco voters passed by 55% Proposition K to permanently close a 2-mile stretch of the Great Highway along Ocean Beach between Sloat and Lincoln Boulevards, which was a street closure originally adopted during the pandemic. The Recreation and Parks Department received a $1 Million grant from the State Coastal Conservancy to plan this new park space. The grant includes community input on long-term design, environmental restoration, access and recreation, safer transportation.

Daily Dose of Nature Campaign

Building on the Nature Pyramid, first developed by Tim Beatley in 2012, a new campaign in Belgium is advocating for a Daily Dose of Nature to encourage children to spend more time outside. The campaign has reached a large national audience through 26 different publications. 

Challenge 6: Markets for Social Impact

“To support broad investment in natureful cities by diversifying public and private participants; to communicate of the socioeconomic benefits of biophilic planning and design, the establishment of standards and metrics; to transform the underlying legal, cultural and social systems in order to prioritize, encourage, and incentivize investment in biophilic planning and design.”

Miami-Dade County

The Living Shoreline Guide is near finalization and provides insights, visuals and steps residents, businesses and developers can take to incorporate natural features into their waterside properties. The guide is a recommendation from the Biscayne Bay Task Force Report.

Raleigh

Raleigh updated its Stormwater Design Manual in 2024 to emphasize and encourage the use of Green Stormwater Infrastructure (GSI). There is also a study underway to explore stormwater utility fee credits to further incentivize above-and-beyond GSI on private and public property.

Toronto

Has been developing an Embodied Carbon Toolkit to assess opportunities to reduce embodied carbon and incentivize adaptive reuse of building structures. The Toolkit will contribute to the next version of the Toronto Green Standard.

Challenge 7: Nature Based Resilient Communities

“To enable community and ecosystem sustainability through nature-based solutions to the conditions of changing climate, environmental degradation, natural disaster, and social unrest.”

Miami-Dade County

Miami-Dade County celebrated the first reforestation effort at Camp Mahachee and completion of Phase 1 of adjacent forest restoration to transform an invasive dominated vineland created by hurricane Andrew into a high performing young forest filled with endangered trees and pollinator supporting species. Learn more about this successful partnership between public and private partners. The county has also released a Draft Urban Forestry Plan, which is a blueprint to reach the county’s goal of 30% urban tree canopy cover. Working towards this goal, the county planted over 16,000 trees in parks, environmentally endangered lands, government facilities, public schools, and church properties.  Additionally, through its Million Trees Miami-Dade and Adopt a Tree programs, the county gave away 10,471 native and Florida friendly trees. 

Portland

The city is piloting a new Trees in the Curb Zone project where underutilized parking spaces will be repurposed for the planting of new street trees. The pilot program will include 15 different planting locations and is a joint project of the city’s transportation, parks, and environmental departments.

Arlington

As part of the voluntary property acquisition program to reduce flood risk, the county has purchased seven properties and is in the process of removing the homes and stabilizing the properties as stormwater overland relief areas (see photos below). These properties are in higher risk flooding locations and will be used to provide overland relief during storms and to provide access for improving the underground stormwater system.

Los Angeles

The city has begun to develop highly localized native plant palettes for the City that will recommend native plants for landscaping based on local environmental conditions and the area of the City a site is located. The city is also currently planning the implementation of community regenerative agriculture, which will increase food stability, promote soil health and the benefits of healthy soils, and support biodiversity.

Raleigh

The Parks, Recreation and Cultural Resources department continued growth of its Community Gardens Program. Two new community gardens were built in 2024.

Challenge 8: Symbiotic Built Environment

“To foster the design of living architecture by integrating nature directly and indirectly into the fabric of urban infrastructure; to aim to create a personal and collective connection with the built environment with resulting identifiable, positive impacts on social cohesion, productivity and wellbeing.”

Arlington

Arlington has created a new Reference Guide to Arlington County Landscape Standards to support development practices to comply with local provisions to protect trees and landscapes. Specifically, the county has sought to require biophilic design and nature-oriented paths and public spaces in new development plans.

Phipps

In May, Phipps announced that it had reached an agreement to acquire the former Irish Centre site in Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill neighborhood. The new satellite site for Phipps’ operations, tentatively named the Phipps Program Staging Center for its dual focus on the growth of plants and communities, will be used as a headquarters for the Conservatory’s Homegrown program, an incubator for new community greening projects throughout the City, a nursery for plants for upcoming flower shows, and a laboratory for research projects. Over time, Phipps plans to make enhancements to the space by transforming it into a green building and beautifying the structure and landscape. This agreement protected the local restored watershed from alternatively proposed plans to create townhouses that would have decimated decades of ecological management work on an important stream (Nine-Mile Run) in the area.