Cities are embedded within and connected to surrounding landscapes. Yet surprisingly little is known or even considered regarding how cities may contribute to regional resilience and biodiversity. Although cities are centers of consumption and land use change, they also represent considerable opportunities for advancing global sustainability and biodiversity goals. Therefore, ecological and evolutionary dynamics as well as environmental conservation, planning, and stewardship activities that occur in cities can be expected to influence regional biodiversity and activities in the surrounding landscape. Scaling from individuals and populations to biodiversity and human communities, each speaker in this session will address how the unique conditions in cities may bolster regional resilience and facilitate recovery from extreme events. We address five main themes: urban evolutionary dynamics and adaptation, population dynamics, landscape heterogeneity, socio-ecological linkages, and ecological design and planning. Cities have altered climate regimes, productivity, and resource bases, as well as altered community structure and species interactions. While these altered conditions often reduce biodiversity, they can also result in adaptations to the urban environment, which may in turn benefit regional resilience by increasing genetic diversity or adaptation to changing climates. These conditions can also create unique opportunities for some species, enabling them to escape from negative interspecific interactions and buffering them against stresses faced during periods of scarcity. Additionally, landscapes around urban centers are often highly modified themselves, and cities may enable some species to escape from disturbance faced elsewhere associated with agriculture, ranching, and other land uses. While much attention has been paid to socio-ecological linkages within cities, few have addressed the role cities may play in enhancing regional socio-ecological linkages. For example, connections to urban nature may help facilitate stewardship and conservation efforts in the region, and urban greening and ecological design may augment ecological functions and connections with the surrounding landscape. This session will include a discussion of the importance of coordinated planning and biodiversity goal setting in supporting regional resilience and improving the ecological benefits that cities can provide. As cities grow and face increasing threats from climate change and extreme events, their potential to negatively impact the surrounding landscape will also increase. This session offers a timely opportunity identify the ways in which cities are already benefitting regional resilience, and to address and reduce the potential negative impacts.