City Resilience Framework

The Challenge

The City Resilience Framework (CRF) is a conceptual framework, offering a common reference point for understanding what we mean when we talk about cities’ resilience. The CRF was first developed alongside Arup in 2014 on the back of extensive research looking at the existing literature, at case studies, and from fieldwork. It has since been updated in 2024 to align with the priorities of city practitioners, the main users of this tool. It aims to help cities prioritize investment, support implementation, and aid community participation and communication. 

CRF’24 is structured around four dimensions that relate to broad areas that impact cities’ resilience ability:

• Health & Wellbeing: systems that guarantee the health and wellbeing of everyone living and working in the city.
• Economy & Society: the social and financial systems that enable urban populations to thrive.
• Infrastructure & Environment: human and natural systems that provide critical services, protect and connect urban citizens.
• Local Governance & Planning: the need for informed, inclusive and integrated decision making.

 The framework identifies 22 goals that describe the fundamental attributes of a resilient system.  The CRF also offers up case studies of resilient cities from within the R-Cities network which have worked to address the most important shocks and stresses in their context.

Access the City Resilience Framework and Index here.

News and Resources