Impact of Climate Change on Disruption to Urban Transport Networks from Pluvial Flooding

Abstract

Short-duration, high-intensity rainfall causes significant disruption to transport operations, and climate change is projected to increase the frequency and intensity of these events. Disruption costs of flooding are currently calculated using crude approaches. To support improved business cases for adapting urban infrastructure to climate change, this paper presents an integrated framework that couples simulations of flooding and transport to calculate the impacts of disruption. A function, constructed from a range of observational and experimental data sources, is used to relate flood depth to vehicle speed, which is more realistic than the typical approach of categorizing a road as either blocked or free flowing. The framework is demonstrated on Newcastle upon Tyne in the United Kingdom and shows that by the 2080s disruption across the city from a 1-in-50-year event could increase by 66%. A criticality index is developed and is shown to provide an effective metric to prioritize intervention options in the road network. In this case, just two adaptation interventions can reduce travel delays across the city by 32%.

How does sub‐hourly rainfall intermittency bias the climatology of hourly and daily rainfalls? Examples from arid and wet tropical Australia

“…Short‐term extremes such as maxima of hourly or sub‐hourly rainfall amounts may change as global climate evolves in a warmer future (Hanel et al ., ; Ye et al ., ; Schroeer and Kirchengast, ), and may lead to landslips or urban flash flooding. Possible increases in extremes are consequently relevant to preparedness and informed management (Beck et al ., ; Chen et al ., ; Chan et al ., ; Prein et al ., ; Beranova et al ., ; Mantegna et al ., ; Nissen and Ulbrich, ; Pregnolato et al ., ). Success in identifying trends in extreme intensities depends on how rainfall data are temporally aggregated (hourly totals, daily totals, etc.…”

The Infrastructure Trolley Problem: Positioning Safe‐to‐fail Infrastructure for Climate Change Adaptation

“…The "100-year return period" is an insufficient probability representation of one in 100 chances of occurrence in any given 1 year (i.e., the 1% AEP). Despite studies that have characterized the impact of climate change on infrastructure Pregnolato et al, 2017), dams, pipelines, roadways, power plants, and other infrastructure continue to be managed without consideration of climate variability. Given the recent variability in weather, these historical distributions may be becoming less useful in planning infrastructure performance for risks under a changing and unpredictable environment (Milly et al, 2008).…”

“…Infrastructure design standards and the infrastructure themselves remain difficult to change even when political, social, economic, and environmental systems change around them (Chester & Allenby, 2018). Despite studies that have characterized the impact of climate change on infrastructure Pregnolato et al, 2017), dams, pipelines, roadways, power plants, and other infrastructure continue to be managed without consideration of climate variability.…”

Infrastructure Resilience to Climate Change

“…Moreover, although most articles are expected to be heavily technical by nature-for example, Bristow and Hay (2017), Pozzi et al (2017), and Xie et al 2017-we are also pleased to offer more qualitative contributions that discuss how formal protocols and institutional change can drive society to become more resilient, such as Zimmerman et al (2017), Douglas et al (2017), and Uda and Kennedy (2018). Finally, the most frequent hazard studied, with five contributions out of fourteen, is flooding, as it has plagued cities and regions across the United States and the world, whether from precipitation (Cook et al 2017;Pregnolato et al 2017;Wisetjindawat et al 2017) or sea-level rise (Sadler et al 2017).…”