A new report from ULI and Heitman, a global real estate investment management firm, points to the pressing need for greater understanding throughout the industry of the investment risks posed by the impacts of climate change. Climate Risk and Real Estate Investment Decision-Makingexplores current methods for assessing and mitigating climate risk in real estate, including physical risks such as catastrophes and transitional risks such as regulatory changes, availability of resources, and attractiveness of locations.

In December, Moody’s Investors Service issued a report encouraging cities to invest in climate adaptation and mitigation. Cities will be evaluated in the future at least in part on how they prepare for both short-term climate “shocks” and longer-term trends associated with climate change. Moody’s is the largest credit rating agency to date to publicly outline how it evaluates climate change risk and integrates it into its credit rating assessments.

Internationally acclaimed architecture professor and architectural historian Vincent Scully, 2003 recipient of the ULI J.C. Nichols Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development, died November 30 at his home in Lynchburg, Virginia. He was 97.

ULI has joined with 127 U.S. mayors, along with the Trust for Public Land and the National Recreation and Park Association in launching a historic “10-minute walk” parks advocacy campaign, establishing the ambitious goal that all Americans should live within a 10-minute walk (or half-mile) of a high-quality park or green space. This bipartisan group includes mayors from all across the country and represents cities large and small, including America’s four largest cities.

Longtime ULI leader Nina J. Gruen, who pioneered the use of behavioral research to predict market demand for commercial and residential real estate, passed away on September 15, 2017. She was 83. Gruen and her husband, Claude Gruen, joined ULI in 1971, not long after founding Gruen Gruen + Associates, a renowned San Francisco–based firm that continues to provide research-based consulting and implementation services to the real estate industry and public land use and planning policy makers. Gruen, who remained active in ULI throughout her career, was elected as the Institute’s first female trustee in 1982, and was named an honorary member in 1996.

The following ten projects—all completed during the past five years—include facilities that strengthen pedestrian links to waterfronts, renovated buildings that open up interiors to views and daylight, and a converted JCPenney department store.

The growing involvement of the real estate industry in helping municipalities manage stormwater runoff with systems using natural resources is explored in a new ULI publication, Harvesting the Value of Water.

Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design recently released a report examining how urban planning and design interventions can help improve housing and urban development practice in Mexico, including densifying existing population centers with infill development and retrofitting infrastructure and services in areas where existing homes have been abandoned.

The word infrastructure, which originated during the 1920s, was unusual enough to still appear in quotation marks in the Wall Street Journalas late as the 1980s. Henry Petroski’s The Road Taken: The History and Future of America’s Infrastructureis an exhaustive tour of the tremendous variety of built works encompassed by the term.

Disruption was a theme that played through much of ULI’s recent Fall Meeting. While the focus was often technology and innovation, a panel at the meeting tackled water issues, calling them “risky business” for the West.