Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has shocked infrastructure systems in unanticipated ways. Seemingly in the course of weeks, our demands for many basic and critical services have radically shifted. With expected long-term effects (i.e., years), COVID-19 is going to have profound impacts on every facet of infrastructure systems, and will shock these systems very differently than the hazards that we often focus on, such as extreme events, disrepair, and terrorist attacks. At the beginning of this pandemic, infrastructure managers are scrambling to respond to changes in demand, and understand what the long-term effects are for how they operate and maintain their systems. We contend that COVID-19 is revealing several important limitations to how we approach and manage our infrastructure, that must be acknowledged and addressed as the pandemic persists, and in a future increasingly characterized by accelerating and increasingly uncertain conditions. These limitations are how i) we prepare for concurrent hazards, ii) frame criticality based on traditional infrastructure sectors and not human capabilities, iii) we emphasize efficiency at a cost to resilience, and iv) leadership is largely focused on stable conditions. Each of these challenges represents a call for major rethinking for how we approach infrastructure, and COVID-19 presents a window of opportunity for change.
Highlights
As COVID-19 propagates rapidly through cities across the world and presents a multitude of public health, social, and economic challenges, a new landscape of issues is emerging for infrastructure that warrants scrutiny
In a future defined by acceleration, increasing uncertainty, and increasing complexity, COVID-19 provides a glimpse of how best practices that were developed under past conditions that focus on efficiency and stability are becoming increasingly insufficient
While the right kind of assets are certainly important and necessary to adapt amid pandemics, it is important to maintain the human capacity and institutional ability to be dynamic and flexible
Summary
As COVID-19 propagates rapidly through cities across the world and presents a multitude of public health, social, and economic challenges, a new landscape of issues is emerging for infrastructure that warrants scrutiny. Infrastructure systems – here framed as consisting of physical assets, governance and institutions, and education – have an important role in shaping human activity and supporting public needs during pandemics.
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