Given that I’m from New York, both of these articles speak to our current relationships with waterways, parks, and resiliency. While I agree that the US is very individually focused in terms of expenses, I believe that citizens of the US are beginning to understand the value of communal resources. As evidence for this statement I would provide the citibike program, and the recent renovation and rise of access to public parks within NYC. While society might not currently be 100% in favor of public facilities, I believe that some more climate crises could cause US citizens to appreciate the value of some communal resources. Additionally, I believe that local governments impacted by climate events will find ways to skirt US citizen’s beliefs in capitalism. For example, I could very easily see the mayor of Hoboken providing tax breaks to those citizens or corporations that begin building green roofs.
Interestingly, waterways play a certain inevitable part in this. If we maintain a better relationship with our waterways, we will gain better resiliency. We can design a better relationship with our waterways by increasing access to them. As pointed out by the “Hudson River Greenway Watertrail” article, more than 70% of the Hudson is blocked by private property. As a result, I would imagine people don’t care about the quality of the river, because it doesn’t directly impact them. If we can deign systems that make the river feel more important to residents of NYC, I imagine we can drastically improve our resiliency.
