What If Urban Growth Was Balanced by Mandatory Green Infrastructure?

We tend to forget that almost all the problems are the result of better engineering of solutions to the general Malthusian problem (global population growth).

We keep claiming that each Malthusian limit has been 'solved' only to hit another within a generation or two. Worst of all, we have great difficulty talking about it ('Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril Sensitive Sunglasses' required, for those of a certain age). 

Quite - sadly as I get older I tend to feel that we are all at risk of emulating the great Thomas Midgley Jr - probably the engineer who most embodied being very well meaning and (at least partly) unintentionally destructive (including sadly to himself in the end).

Also, "This planet has, or had, a problem - which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most if these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy." 15th March 1978! (And I do remember listening to it at the time, used to rush home after computing evening classes.) Of course in the UK the equivalent of those small green pieces of paper, to allow for inflation and the introduction of the one pound coin, is now small brown pieces of plastic...

Yaseen Khan Mohammed CEng said:

What are your thoughts — should green infrastructure be a mandatory performance offset for new developments?

So the challenge is that word "should" - always a difficult word to use, unless it's paired with "to achieve xxx consequences should we do yyy?" To make cities more comfortable and pleasant to live in, to support recovery of biodiversity, and to reduce the rate of increase of global warming, yes we should. To increase short term wealth generation and employment in the construction industry (the movement of those small green pieces of paper again) no we shouldn't. It's up to what we want to achieve. As engineers we're typically employed to achieve the latter - personally I salve my conscience by working in the rail industry which I think on average tends to support the former. But not always.

Andy Millar said:

Quite - sadly as I get older I tend to feel that we are all at risk of emulating the great Thomas Midgley Jr - probably the engineer who most embodied being very well meaning and (at least partly) unintentionally destructive (including sadly to himself in the end).

I would suggest the case of Midgley is more complex, and raises some important questions to reflect upon, because the historical reports set out that once he had discovered tetraethyl-lead's (TEL) potential as a petrol anti-knock additive, even before it entered into use, it soon became clear how dangerous TEL was because several workers were killed by lead-poisoning in the early manufacturing plants built to produce it, along with numerous other workers suffering from hallucinations and severe psychiatric disturbances from lead poisoning from TEL.

Midgley himself is reported as having suffered from lead poisoning from his activities with TEL and having to take time off to recover, but despite this he continued to insist TEL was safe and to promote it as being safe by handling and inhaling it despite the dangers this posed. 

www.thechemicalengineer.com/.../

Oh absolutely...hence my comment "at least partly". But also an object lesson that there is a human tendency to keep falsely believing in and defending a project once you and every one around you has become invested in it, even when the evidence is going against you, however much we might like to convince ourselves otherwise. 

Most engineers through their careers will, if they are honest, look back at at least one phase of their work and say "I can't believe now that we all thought that project was a good idea". For most of us, hopefully, they will just be projects that lost a bit of money or a bit of credibility for the company. But some examples go to very dark places (and let's not go there in this discussion). 

And some (otherwise perfectly competent) engineers will go into retirement always claiming that their project was misunderstood, however much it's obvious to others that it was a really bad idea...the human brain is really good at justifying daft decisions to itself!

A couple more thoughts on this overnight - bringing it back to the OP and also Philip's comments. For infrastructure projects there's a variety of approaches we all see engineers take:

• "I've chosen to work for a company who specialise in green space urban planning" 
• "We work with environmental consultants who do all the environmental audits" (although does beg the question what remit the environmental consultants were given...I work with environmental consultants and come across them a lot in my private life, they do get very frustrated at being employed to give the answer the project wanted!)
• "If we didn't take on this contract someone else would, and I've got a mortgage to pay"
• "We could get on much quicker if the green woke brigade didn't get in our way"

All of these engineers will have come to terms with their position, and be perfectly capable of justifying it - in the case of the first and last bullets sometimes quite loudly. The majority are probably somewhere across the middle two. In reality life is complicated and there's no "correct" answer. Personally, to make me feel comfortable with infrastructure projects, I like to see environmental consultants being fully and openly engaged. Environmental audits are incredibly complex to carry out, however over the last 40 years society's capabilities in this area have developed hugely. But they only work if they are fully integrated into the project, and if those at the top are prepared to listen to them. The engineers need to work in partnership with the environmental audit team - if each side sees the other as a threat it isn't going to work. If they work together they can come up with brilliant solutions.

As a bit of good news, the team I work in delivers Network Rail's internal "safety and sustainability" training course, I'm one of the trainers on the safety side. The level of enthusiasm we see on the sustainability side is huge. Of course we do get the occasional attendee who (loudly) falls into the fourth bullet above, but generally there is real interest from engineers in knowing how to deliver projects which are integrated into the environment, rather than fighting it or bulldozing it. Which given that it's a course that NR staff are sent on, rather than electing to attend, is very cheering - at least it is for green woke liberal like me! (Of course there's not always so much enthusiasm on the safety side, which I am always happy to admit is, sadly, one of the most boring subjects in the world to be trained in. I do my best...)

A couple more thoughts on this overnight - bringing it back to the OP and also Philip's comments. For infrastructure projects there's a variety of approaches we all see engineers take:

• "I've chosen to work for a company who specialise in green space urban planning" 
• "We work with environmental consultants who do all the environmental audits" (although does beg the question what remit the environmental consultants were given...I work with environmental consultants and come across them a lot in my private life, they do get very frustrated at being employed to give the answer the project wanted!)
• "If we didn't take on this contract someone else would, and I've got a mortgage to pay"
• "We could get on much quicker if the green woke brigade didn't get in our way"

All of these engineers will have come to terms with their position, and be perfectly capable of justifying it - in the case of the first and last bullets sometimes quite loudly. The majority are probably somewhere across the middle two. In reality life is complicated and there's no "correct" answer. Personally, to make me feel comfortable with infrastructure projects, I like to see environmental consultants being fully and openly engaged. Environmental audits are incredibly complex to carry out, however over the last 40 years society's capabilities in this area have developed hugely. But they only work if they are fully integrated into the project, and if those at the top are prepared to listen to them. The engineers need to work in partnership with the environmental audit team - if each side sees the other as a threat it isn't going to work. If they work together they can come up with brilliant solutions.

As a bit of good news, the team I work in delivers Network Rail's internal "safety and sustainability" training course, I'm one of the trainers on the safety side. The level of enthusiasm we see on the sustainability side is huge. Of course we do get the occasional attendee who (loudly) falls into the fourth bullet above, but generally there is real interest from engineers in knowing how to deliver projects which are integrated into the environment, rather than fighting it or bulldozing it. Which given that it's a course that NR staff are sent on, rather than electing to attend, is very cheering - at least it is for green woke liberal like me! (Of course there's not always so much enthusiasm on the safety side, which I am always happy to admit is, sadly, one of the most boring subjects in the world to be trained in. I do my best...)