Analysis of vulnerability assessment frameworks and methodologies in urban areas

Abstract

The occurrence of major natural disasters in recent years has impacted large cities worldwide and boosted the need of assessing urban resilience. As a key factor of resilience, vulnerability correlates attributes of communities with the level of damage caused by hazards. Although a large amount of studies has reviewed the assessment of vulnerability from the perspective of a particular hazard, the combined analysis involving all kind of hazards and vulnerability dimensions in the urban context is uncommon. This research provides a critical analysis of a selected sample of 72 contributions released from 1998 to 2018 and related to the appraisal of vulnerability, in order to determine their adequacy in the evaluation of urban vulnerability. The findings stemming from this process revealed that the social dimension was a priority, whilst qualitative components associated with risk awareness were slightly covered. Furthermore, multi-criteria decision analysis and weighting allocation were the most widely used techniques to address urban vulnerability, whilst 32 methodologies were bespoke built to be applied to particular locations. Most of the cases examined were oriented to specific hazards, with only 10 of them focused on multiple hazards. Hence, the results suggest the need for developing a new framework applicable to multiple hazards worldwide to bridge the identified gaps.

Review article: A systematic review and future prospects of flood vulnerability indices

“…Nevertheless, both the terminology and methodology used in these assessments are still a subject of discussion (Aroca-Jiménez et al, 2020;Kelman, 2018). In fact, some consider vulnerability as being a function of exposure and susceptibility (Balica et al, 2009;IPCC, 2001;Turner et al, 2003;UNDP, 2014), while others separate these concepts (Dilley et al, 2005;Fedeski and Gwilliam, 2007) as it is possible to be exposed to a hazard and not be vulnerable. For instance, a person may live in an area prone to natural hazards but have sufficient alternatives to modify the structure of their house to prevent potential losses (Cardona et al, 2012).…”

A data mining approach to the relationships between landslides and open-pit mining activity: a case study in Soacha (Cundinamarca)

“…There are political, cultural, and economic factors whose evaluation may vary according to the geographical region where the effects occur. That is why it is essential to establish measurable relationships between mining and the effects on the physical environment which produce various sorts of conflicts that impact the actors [7,9]. A clearer identification of causes and effects allows the actors involved to arrive at converging solutions that they can adopt in a more rational and objective way [10].…”

“…Environmental problems arise due to the ways in which each society develops its technological, organizational, economic and political processes and the manner these processes manifest in the planet's biophysical systems. Environmental problems are only solved to the extent that structural changes occur in the processes that generate culture [9,10], which can only be achieved through an objective determination of causes and effects.…”

“…Research about environmental issues and conflicts linked to mining activity has been tackled from alternative approaches rooted in human geography and economic geography. From these perspectives, territorial configurations and the social production of space and are riddled with conflicts [1,9,10].…”

“…This study uses data mining as a tool to connect the different variables considered in this study. Through data mining, it is possible to discover information in the form of patterns, changes, links, and significant structures of large amounts of stored data [9]. Data mining consists of obtaining: 1) dependency analysis 2) identification of classes, 3) description of concepts, and 4) detection of deviations, extreme cases, or anomalies [13].…”