Building Resilience in the City: Nature, Memory and Community in the Face of Climate Change

This chapter explores the role of Service-Learning (SL) and participatory methodologies in building urban resilience and environmental justice, based on the case of the Indigenous people of San Andrés Totoltepec, in Mexico City. Given the context of climate crisis, social inequality and metropolitan expansion, the chapter explores how collaboration between universities and local communities can produce transformative urban design proposals that have a tangible impact on the territory and education. The project, promoted by the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico, was structured in three phases: participatory territorial diagnosis, international academic exchange and co-design of intervention strategies in the public space. Through collective mapping workshops, community tours and feedback dynamics, eleven priority areas of action were identified, resulting in nineteen student proposals, of which seven were socialized and validated by the community. These initiatives integrated criteria of bioclimatic, green infrastructure and Nature-Based Solutions, aimed at improving accessibility, safety, water management and social cohesion. The results show the potential of SL to articulate local and academic knowledge, generating viable and socially legitimized projects. Likewise, community participation strengthened the appropriation of public space and citizen empowerment, even achieving the nomination of proposals in mechanisms such as the Participatory Budget. Beyond the specific outcomes of the study, it highlights broader implications for urban planning education and governance. It suggests that co-design and social learning (SL) can operate as scalable frameworks to foster inclusive, climate-adaptive and socially just urban development.