A plan for all seasons

Academic develops a resilience framework to help Ningbo face, and recover from, the COVID-19 outbreak and future challenges, Yang Feiyue reports.

Professor Ali Cheshmehzangi didn't idle away his time in isolation at his home in Ningbo, eastern Zhejiang province.

If anything, he was busier than usual.

The British-Iranian professor has applied his expertise to help the city of Ningbo during the COVID-19 outbreak.

He spent 20 days at home developing a comprehensive urban resilience framework and delivered it to the local government on Feb 10.

"My sole intention was to help the city where I live," Cheshmehzangi says.

The idea was to assist local authorities in protecting citizens during the outbreak and ensure that life returns to normal as swiftly as possible after it.

Cheshmehzangi is an associate professor in architecture and urban design at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China, and specializes in urban growth and development from the perspectives of urban transition and urban sustainability.

"This framework is intended to aid the city administration's decision-making by evaluating two key categories－management and provision－with the former looking at institutional and operational aspects, and the latter at service and supply," Cheshmehzangi says.

According to the framework, each of the categories is divided into the specific systems that are essential to the city, including healthcare, food supply and transportation. Each of them are assessed for their resilience, both during the epidemic and in the post-epidemic recovery phase.

He says he had the idea on Jan 25, when the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan was starting to attract national attention. The framework was developed on Feb 2.

Cheshmehzangi spent the first few days observing the situation and how it was developing.

He drove around key areas in one or two districts, observing and recording a variety of sites, including hospitals, business areas, commercial and retail, residential, and educational areas.