Introducing the Making Nature's City Toolkit

In partnership with the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Urban Alliance, the San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) has developed the Making Nature’s City Toolkit (makingnaturescity.org), an interactive, beautifully designed website that guides cities through an actionable, science-based approach to support biodiversity in cities. Based on SFEI’s 2019 report titled Making Nature’s City, the Toolkit is intended to make the report’s core urban biodiversity framework more accessible to actors and decision-makers in cities across the world, including policymakers, planners, designers, and natural resource managers. 

There are three main components of the Toolkit. 

1. Elements and actions - The science-based urban biodiversity framework identifies seven elements that work together to maximize biodiversity. With this toolkit, you can learn about these elements and actions that residents, organizations, and city agencies can take to support urban nature.
2. Precedents - Precedents offer a high-level view of what other cities are doing to support urban ecosystems. By sharing case studies from around the world, the Toolkit demonstrates how scientific concepts and local expertise can be applied to support nature in your city. 
3. Overview of important analyses and datasets -  As a city or community considers supporting urban ecosystems, a fundamental first step is to conduct spatial analyses for each of the seven elements. The resulting insights can guide the development of a strategic plan to support urban biodiversity. The Toolkit compiles a robust list of analyses, datasets, and databases that you can use to identify urban biodiversity opportunities and strategies.

The Making Nature’s City Toolkit was made possible by generous support from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin; IUCN Urban Alliance; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Water Quality Improvement Fund; and Google Ecology Program.