Sponsored by Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine; National Research Council's (NRC) Disasters Roundtable; National Research Council's (NRC) Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability. 

Tulane University
School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine
Diboll Auditorium
1440 Canal Street, New Orleans, LA

On June 1-2, 2006, the National Academies organized a workshop to discuss how areas of the Gulf Coast region could be rebuilt for health, sustainability, and disaster preparedness in the aftermath of the 2005 hurricanes. Three National Academies' roundtables: the Institute of Medicine’s Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research and Medicine; the National Research Council's (NRC) Disasters Roundtable; and the NRC's Roundtable on Science and Technology for Sustainability worked with leaders from the Gulf Coast region tin organizing a two-day workshop to discuss this issue. The workshop, hosted by Tulane University in New Orleans, brought together groups from affected regions and some participants from other regions of the United States, including experts involved in rebuilding efforts; members of the academic community, public and environmental health specialists, urban planners, environmental scientists, and economists; government officials from the local, state, and federal levels; architects; representatives from major industries in the region; and civil society.

Workshop participants discussed the interconnectedness of the built environment, the natural environment, human health, and disaster resilience, and explored opportunities for taking advantage of considerable advances in understanding of the linkages between the built environment and human physical and mental health. The agenda for this workshop was developed by members of the three roundtables through a series of planning meetings with local communities from the Gulf Coast region.  The workshop included sessions on transportation- and pedestrian-oriented design; healthy, sustainable, and affordable building materials and techniques; preservation of critical ecosystems, focusing on important ecosystem services; and disaster mitigation and preparedness -- with an emphasis on the interdependence of all of these.