Managing for Change: Integrating Functionality, Resiliency, and Sustainability for Stormwater Infrastructure Assessment

Abstract

The infrastructure that serves us is aging, and yet it must remain functional to service daily needs, resilient to unforeseen events, and sustainable for future generations. This challenge emphasizes the need to accurately measure and assess the state of infrastructure to meet future demands while avoiding unwanted environmental consequences—what is truly meant by resilience or sustainability? Current assessment tools emphasize primarily the functional dimensions of environmental, social, and economic progress for infrastructure, and often as separate issues without comprehensively addressing the overall issues or changing demands. This paper presents a three-step framework focusing on the functionality-resiliency-sustainability aspects of infrastructure to assess its overall sustainability. A stormwater system in Toronto has been used to illustrate how the framework can be applied. This assessment framework is developed to integrate the three domains of functionality, resiliency, and sustainability based on three criteria: resource minimization, public health, and change management. Thirty-three indicators are identified—19 for functionality, 8 for resiliency, and 6 for sustainability—and guides have been developed for critical indicators to help decision makers step through the scoring process. A detailed multiobjective assessment is undertaken to score the overall functionality, resiliency, and sustainability of the infrastructure.