Transformation through Design

Resilient by Design Bay Area Challenge

North Richmond, CA

Leading with Equity

The Bay Area is proactively preparing for the impacts of climate change. Through the Resilient by Design process, the Mithun Home Team joined with the North Richmond community to explore ways the neighborhood can adapt in place, prioritize projects and start implementation. The resulting collection of projects, ouR-HOME, emerges from the community’s ideas for building health, wealth and home ownership for more than 5,000 residents—turning investments in sea level rise adaptations and aging infrastructure into opportunities for all.

Home Ownership and Wealth Building

Building on a vibrant local history, neighborhood stabilization and strategies for home ownership underlie the vision for a resilient North Richmond. A community land trust and small lot splits use vacant lots as a catalyst to lower the cost of entry for ownership, key for residents to have agency to collectively and individually respond to climate change.

Delivering Multiple Benefits

Major community infrastructure, roadways and valuable marsh habitat are threatened by sea level rise. Proven green infrastructure strategies like raingardens, horizontal levees, wetlands restoration and tree planting programs combine to yield innovation and benefits for the neighborhood: health, wealth, habitat and housing affordability.