A spatial multicriteria prioritizing approach for geohydrological risk mitigation planning in small and densely urbanized Mediterranean basins

Abstract

16Landslides and floods, particularly flash floods, occurred currently in many Mediterranean catchments as a consequence of heavy rainfall events, causing damages 18 and sometimes casualties. The high hazard is often associated to intense urbanization in particular along the coastline where streams are habitually culverted. The necessary risk 20 mitigation strategies should be applied at catchment scale, considering the concurrent landslides and flood events and would need to be accurately planned in order to optimize 22 the available economic resources. In the present work 21 small catchments in a high hazard area have been assessed and 24 compared through three sets of parameters: one describing the morphometricmorphological features related to flood and landslide hazard, another describing the 26 degree of urbanization and of anthropogenic modifications at catchment scale and the last related to the elements that are exposed to risk. The aim of the research is to constitute a 28 priority scale among the small catchments, applying the multicriteria analysis technique to the descriptive parameters and giving a support tool for decision makers, supporting a 30 strong scheduling of long-time planning interventions at catchment scale. This approach could be applied in similar context, even at sub-catchment scale, after 32 identifying a suitable set of descriptive parameters depending on the active geomorphological processes and the kind of anthropogenic modification, obtaining the 34 optimization of economic resources. 36

Large-scale geomorphology of the Entella River floodplain (Italy) for coastal urban areas management

“…Urban geomorphological mapping is a useful tool for understanding the effects of urbanization on geomorphic systems and geo-hydrological risk (Paliaga et al, 2018), also with regards to climate change. Furthermore, it contributes to the improvement of the geological heritage in urban areas.…”