Central Puget Sound Regional Open Space Strategy: Illuminating the value of open space in advancing urban sustainability
Presentation Abstract
The Puget Sound faces significant ecological and economic pressures, which will be further exacerbated by the increasing intensity of climate change impacts. These stresses affect water quality and supply, fish, farm and forest production, flood and other environmental hazard vulnerability, biodiversity, economic opportunities, and overall quality of life. Additionally, not all of the region’s people equitably share the health, recreational, and aesthetic benefits open spaces provide. It is essential to more fully account for the value of green infrastructure provided by open space systems and position it alongside other foundational investments such as transportation or education as a necessary dedication of public and private resources to shape future development and ensure community well-being. Actions must be coordinated at the regional level. Ecological systems, in particular, must be considered at the watershed scale, and protecting threatened rural and resource lands, public health, and community development require inter-jurisdictional solutions.The Regional Open Space Strategy (ROSS) is an effort to address this need and to conserve and enhance open space systems that contribute to the ecological, economic, social, recreational, and aesthetic vitality of the Central Puget Sound. The effectiveness of the numerous ongoing conservation efforts in the region can be greatly enhanced by directing added resources to the most critical priorities and supporting individual efforts through cooperative approaches to shared challenges. The ROSS seeks to stitch together and foster more effective collaboration among the many conservation activities underway by gathering key experts and building social capital around cross-cutting challenges such as health, social equity, economic development, climate change, and biodiversity. This requires a concerted investment in new metrics and new conceptions of both the benefits and the tradeoffs that are made in conservation when evaluated against these broader challenges. The ROSS seeks to create a robust, diverse, accessible, and connected regional open space system by adjusting to and even reinforcing other community objectives and more effectively illustrating how communities benefit from investments in natural green infrastructure.
Session Title
Session S-04G: Using Cross-Sectoral Collaboration to Create Long-Lasting Solutions
Conference Track
Planning Assessment & Communication
Conference Name
Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference (2014 : Seattle, Wash.)
Document Type
Event
Start Date
1-5-2014 8:30 AM
End Date
1-5-2014 10:00 AM
Location
Room 6E
Genre/Form
conference proceedings; presentations (communicative events)
Contributing Repository
Digital content made available by University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University.
Subjects – Topical (LCSH)
Open spaces--Washington (State)--Puget Sound; Sustainable development--Washington (State)--Puget Sound
Geographic Coverage
Salish Sea (B.C. and Wash.); Puget Sound (Wash.)
Rights
This resource is displayed for educational purposes only and may be subject to U.S. and international copyright laws. For more information about rights or obtaining copies of this resource, please contact University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA 98225-9103, USA (360-650-7534; heritage.resources@wwu.edu) and refer to the collection name and identifier. Any materials cited must be attributed to the Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference Records, University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University.
Type
Text
Language
English
Format
application/pdf
Central Puget Sound Regional Open Space Strategy: Illuminating the value of open space in advancing urban sustainability
Room 6E
The Puget Sound faces significant ecological and economic pressures, which will be further exacerbated by the increasing intensity of climate change impacts. These stresses affect water quality and supply, fish, farm and forest production, flood and other environmental hazard vulnerability, biodiversity, economic opportunities, and overall quality of life. Additionally, not all of the region’s people equitably share the health, recreational, and aesthetic benefits open spaces provide. It is essential to more fully account for the value of green infrastructure provided by open space systems and position it alongside other foundational investments such as transportation or education as a necessary dedication of public and private resources to shape future development and ensure community well-being. Actions must be coordinated at the regional level. Ecological systems, in particular, must be considered at the watershed scale, and protecting threatened rural and resource lands, public health, and community development require inter-jurisdictional solutions.The Regional Open Space Strategy (ROSS) is an effort to address this need and to conserve and enhance open space systems that contribute to the ecological, economic, social, recreational, and aesthetic vitality of the Central Puget Sound. The effectiveness of the numerous ongoing conservation efforts in the region can be greatly enhanced by directing added resources to the most critical priorities and supporting individual efforts through cooperative approaches to shared challenges. The ROSS seeks to stitch together and foster more effective collaboration among the many conservation activities underway by gathering key experts and building social capital around cross-cutting challenges such as health, social equity, economic development, climate change, and biodiversity. This requires a concerted investment in new metrics and new conceptions of both the benefits and the tradeoffs that are made in conservation when evaluated against these broader challenges. The ROSS seeks to create a robust, diverse, accessible, and connected regional open space system by adjusting to and even reinforcing other community objectives and more effectively illustrating how communities benefit from investments in natural green infrastructure.
