Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ClimateJusticeReady (ClimateJusticeReady)
Reporting period: 2023-10-01 to 2025-05-31
The ClimateJusticeReady project was meant to address a growing paradox in climate adaptation: while green infrastructure is increasingly promoted to reduce climate risks such as flooding and heat, it has often unintentionally triggered gentrification and displacement, particularly of low-income and racialized residents. Cities like Barcelona and Boston—leaders in climate resilience—have seen this contradiction emerge most visibly. Despite strong commitments to environmental sustainability, municipal green projects were insufficiently coupled with social equity safeguards, leading to what the project termed “green climate gentrification.”
Building on the findings of the PI’s ERC project GreenLULUs, which revealed widespread patterns of green gentrification across North America and Europe, ClimateJusticeReady sought to move from retrospective analysis to predictive action. The project’s primary objective was to develop tools and analysis that cities and communities could use to anticipate and prevent green climate gentrification before it occurred.
The project had two main goals:
1. To co-develop a replicable prediction tool and index identifying neighborhoods at risk of green climate gentrification.
2. To co-design and pilot a policy or community-based instrument—such as climate resilience funds or minority-led green business grants—to prevent displacement and strengthen local adaptive capacity.
These goals were pursued through a participatory, multi-stakeholder approach that actively involved city planners, researchers, and civic organizations, particularly from historically marginalized communities. The methodological innovation of the project lay in combining quantitative spatial analysis (of an indexe of vulnerability to climate gentrification, measured as exposure to climate gentrification plus sensitivity to climate gentrification minus adaptative capacity to climate gentrification) with qualitative input from local communities about perceived risks, needs, and priorities.
Building on the findings of the PI’s ERC project GreenLULUs, which revealed widespread patterns of green gentrification across North America and Europe, ClimateJusticeReady sought to move from retrospective analysis to predictive action. The project’s primary objective was to develop tools and analysis that cities and communities could use to anticipate and prevent green climate gentrification before it occurred.
The project had two main goals:
1. To co-develop a replicable prediction tool and index identifying neighborhoods at risk of green climate gentrification.
2. To co-design and pilot a policy or community-based instrument—such as climate resilience funds or minority-led green business grants—to prevent displacement and strengthen local adaptive capacity.
These goals were pursued through a participatory, multi-stakeholder approach that actively involved city planners, researchers, and civic organizations, particularly from historically marginalized communities. The methodological innovation of the project lay in combining quantitative spatial analysis (of an indexe of vulnerability to climate gentrification, measured as exposure to climate gentrification plus sensitivity to climate gentrification minus adaptative capacity to climate gentrification) with qualitative input from local communities about perceived risks, needs, and priorities.
The project unfolded across several workstreams developed both for Barcelona and Boston:
• Workstream 1 focused on identifying current and planned green infrastructure projects, computing exposure and sensitivity to gentrification, and mapping adaptive capacity.
• Workstream 2 created and validated a vulnerability index by integrating these factors and conducting participatory workshops to ground-truth and refine results.
• Workstream 3 mobilized the findings to co-design and pilot actionable anti-displacement instruments tailored to each city.
Workstream 1 and 2 involved the participation of researchers and research advisors from the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and Northeastern University who identified all greening projects recently deployed in the metropolitan areas of both cities, collected indicators to build the vulnerability to climate gentrification index (see example for Barcelona in attached image), and then converted the data at the census tract levels. They then built maps of vulnerability to climate gentrification. This process was co-produced with civic groups and planners from both cities where we organized workshops with them so that they could identify additional indicators of vulnerability to climate gentrification, refine findings, and ground truth patterns. The final results were presented in two large events attended by those same representatives in both cities as well as academic advisors. Last in Workstream 3, we built on our collaboration with and delivered seed grants to civic groups in both cities (Sindicat de Llogateres in Boston and Comunidades Enraizadas together with Everett Community Growers) in order to support their combined climate and housing justice work. In Boston, this grant served to learn about the model of community land trust developed by Comunidades Enraizadas and build the first steps of a community land trust in Everett. In Barcelona, it served to support the training of residents on climate gentrification, the door to door canvassing of a neighborhood already affected by climate gentrification and where residents organized street protests against housing displacement, as well as communications materials. We also created policy reports for both cities as well as video materials (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=830OAxII5is(opens in new window) and https://www.bcnuej.org/projects/climatejusticeready/(opens in new window))
• Workstream 1 focused on identifying current and planned green infrastructure projects, computing exposure and sensitivity to gentrification, and mapping adaptive capacity.
• Workstream 2 created and validated a vulnerability index by integrating these factors and conducting participatory workshops to ground-truth and refine results.
• Workstream 3 mobilized the findings to co-design and pilot actionable anti-displacement instruments tailored to each city.
Workstream 1 and 2 involved the participation of researchers and research advisors from the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and Northeastern University who identified all greening projects recently deployed in the metropolitan areas of both cities, collected indicators to build the vulnerability to climate gentrification index (see example for Barcelona in attached image), and then converted the data at the census tract levels. They then built maps of vulnerability to climate gentrification. This process was co-produced with civic groups and planners from both cities where we organized workshops with them so that they could identify additional indicators of vulnerability to climate gentrification, refine findings, and ground truth patterns. The final results were presented in two large events attended by those same representatives in both cities as well as academic advisors. Last in Workstream 3, we built on our collaboration with and delivered seed grants to civic groups in both cities (Sindicat de Llogateres in Boston and Comunidades Enraizadas together with Everett Community Growers) in order to support their combined climate and housing justice work. In Boston, this grant served to learn about the model of community land trust developed by Comunidades Enraizadas and build the first steps of a community land trust in Everett. In Barcelona, it served to support the training of residents on climate gentrification, the door to door canvassing of a neighborhood already affected by climate gentrification and where residents organized street protests against housing displacement, as well as communications materials. We also created policy reports for both cities as well as video materials (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=830OAxII5is(opens in new window) and https://www.bcnuej.org/projects/climatejusticeready/(opens in new window))
The impact of ClimateJusticeReady was twofold. First, it helped shift urban climate adaptation planning from a technocratic model to a socially inclusive one by integrating social science methods and justice-centered perspectives. Second, it empowered communities not just to resist displacement but to co-create climate solutions aligned with their needs and knowledge. By demonstrating how tools and policies can be locally adapted and scaled, the project supported broader uptake across municipalities facing similar tensions between ecological and social goals. Ultimately, ClimateJusticeReady contributed to advancing intersectional climate justice by developing concrete pathways to protect vulnerable residents from the unintended consequences of climate adaptation, ensuring that resilience-building did not come at the cost of social equity. It also brought together urban actors working closely on addressing the compounding climate and housing crisis through an international workshop we organized in Barcelona in September/October 2025, which included participants/partners from Boston and Barcelona representing both municipal actors and nonprofit groups.
Academically, the project helped to move research forward on climate gentrification studies as well as on heat justice studies (article in Nature Cities, article on the Future of Gentrification submitted to CITIES, and article on the creation of a climate vulnerability index and its results submitted to the C40 journal). Climate Justice Ready helped the write up of two new grants submitted by collaborators of the project to the SSHRC research council in Canada and to the Wellcome Trust in the UK.
It also created different video materials as described above.
Academically, the project helped to move research forward on climate gentrification studies as well as on heat justice studies (article in Nature Cities, article on the Future of Gentrification submitted to CITIES, and article on the creation of a climate vulnerability index and its results submitted to the C40 journal). Climate Justice Ready helped the write up of two new grants submitted by collaborators of the project to the SSHRC research council in Canada and to the Wellcome Trust in the UK.
It also created different video materials as described above.