🔗 Integrated Sectoral Resilience Strategies
Cities are building strategies focused on specific sectors like water, energy or mobility that apply an integrated, cross-stakeholder approach to manage risks, align priorities and enhance resilience.
How cities are applying it
• In Melbourne, the Heat Safe City initiative shows how extreme heat requires coordinated action across public health, planning, infrastructure, emergency management and social services.
• Montreal’s Heat Action Plan uses a similar model, aligning health authorities, urban planners and community partners to identify vulnerable populations, design targeted interventions and protect residents during extreme heat events.
• Cities such as Ahmedabad and Santiago have developed comprehensive Heat Resilience Plans that combine data analysis, early warning systems, cooling infrastructure and community outreach.
• At a wider systems scale, Chicago’s 2050 Climate Action Plan demonstrates how sectoral strategies guide long-term transformation in energy, buildings, mobility and public health
Together, these examples show how sector-focused resilience strategies help cities coordinate across agencies, shape coherent investments and apply resilience thinking to risks that cut across multiple systems.
Why it matters
Sectoral strategies give cities the structure needed to manage complex risks within systems that influence daily life. Extreme heat is a clear example: it affects health, energy demand, mobility and the functioning of public spaces. Integrated strategies ensure decisions across these systems reinforce one another and help cities protect people, improve service delivery and guide long-term investment.