Urban Planning for City Leaders - Cities Alliance

Terms used in this bookResilience is the capacity to adapt whenexposed to a hazard or systemic change in orderto maintain an acceptable level of functionalorganization.Smart grid: A smart grid is an electrical gridthat uses computers and other technologyto gather and act on information, such asinformation about the behavior of suppliersand consumers, in an automated fashion toimprove the efficiency, reliability, economics andsustainability of the production and distributionof electricity.Subsidy and cross-subsidy: A benefit given bythe government to groups or individuals, usuallyin the form of a cash payment or tax reduction.The subsidy is usually given to remove sometype of burden, promote certain behaviour orfor equity reasons. Cross-subsidies imply thattariffs or other prices for services and goods areset in a way that distributes costs differentlyamong different categories of customers. Onemain objective is to reduce the price barriers foraccess to certain services for certain customergroups.Value capture is the harnessing, through manydifferent mechanisms, for example taxation,of the increase in land and building valuebrought about by planning, public investments,development of new services etc.5