Resilient By Design Bay Area Challenge: South Bay Sponge

JLP+D provided economic and funding advisory services for the design and development of the South Bay Sponge project, an ecological urban design that covers more than 20 miles of shoreline in the heart of Silicon Valley, encompassing the expansive (and flood vulnerable) tech campuses of Google and Facebook, as well as economically distressed communities including East Palo Alto.

The team’s overall design framework sets a four-pronged approach, including: 1) “soil swap” to cooperate across jurisdictions on assembling a protective shoreline; 2) “land-use swap” for maximizing green infrastructure and coordinating densification and de-densification at the Bay’s edge; 3) “sponges” for establishing large-scale natural systems for flood protection, recreation, habitat and additional benefits; and 4) “creeks” to increase storage and absorptive capacity through widening and softening edges. These diverse and complementary strategies are integrated in the South Bay Sponge concept and form a holistic, pragmatic plan that advances adaptation, cooperation, enrichment and connection for numerous communities and entities across boundaries and jurisdictions in the South Bay.