AN OPEN RISK INDEX WITH LEARNING INDICATORS FROM OSM-TAGS, DEVELOPED BY MACHINE LEARNING AND TRAINED WITH THE WORLDRISKINDEX

In many urban areas, people face high exposure to hazards. Resettling them to safer locations becomes a major strategy, not least because of climate change. This paper dives into the success factors of government-led resettlement in Manila and finds surprising results which challenge the usual narrative and fuel the conversation on resettlement as an adaptation strategy. Contrary to expectations, the location – whether urban or rural – of the new home is less important than safety from floods.

This work deepens the understanding of how perceived heat stress, human vulnerability (e.g. age, income) and adaptive capacities (e.g. green, shaded spaces) are coupled with urban structures. The results show that perceived heat stress decreases with distance from urban center, however, human vulnerability and adaptive capacities depend stronger on inner-variations and differences between urban structures. Planning policies and adaptation strategies should account for these differences.

Adapting to climate extremes is a challenge for spatial planning. Risk maps that include not just a consideration of hazards but also social vulnerability can help. We develop social vulnerability maps for the Stuttgart region, Germany. We show the maps, describe how and why we developed them, and provide an analysis of practitioners’ needs and their feedback. Insights presented in this paper can help to improve map usability and to better link research and planning practice.

In post-disaster reconstruction, emphasis should be placed on critical and sensitive infrastructures. In Germany as in other countries, sensitive infrastructures have not yet been focused on – therefore, we developed a method for determining the risk sensitive infrastructures are facing in the context of riverine and pluvial flooding. The easy-to-use assessment framework can be applied to various sensitive infrastructures, e.g. to qualify and accelerate decisions in the reconstruction process.