Towards Automated Analysis of Urban Infrastructure after Natural Disasters using Remote Sensing

Natural disasters, such as earthquakes and hurricanes, are an unpreventable component of the complex and changing environment we live in. Continued research and advancement in disaster mitigation through prediction of and preparation for impacts have undoubtedly saved many lives and prevented significant amounts of damage, but it is inevitable that some events will cause destruction and loss of life due to their sheer magnitude and proximity to built-up areas. Consequently, development of effective and efficient disaster response methodologies is a research topic of great interest. A successful emergency response is dependent on a comprehensive understanding of the scenario at hand. It is crucial to assess the state of the infrastructure and transportation network, so that resources can be allocated efficiently. Obstructions to the roadways are one of the biggest inhibitors to effective emergency response. To this end, airborne and satellite remote sensing platforms have been used extensively to collect overhead imagery and other types of data in the event of a natural disaster. The ability of these platforms to rapidly probe large areas is ideal in a situation where a timely response could result in saving lives. Typically, imagery is delivered to emergency management officials who then visually inspect it to determine where roads are obstructed and buildings have collapsed. Manual interpretation of imagery is a slow process and is limited by the quality of the imagery and what the human eye can perceive. In order to overcome the time and resource limitations of manual interpretation, this dissertation inves- tigated the feasibility of performing fully automated post-disaster analysis of roadways and buildings using airborne remote sensing data. First, a novel algorithm for detecting roadway debris piles from airborne light detection and ranging (lidar) point clouds and estimating their volumes is presented. Next, a method for detecting roadway flooding in aerial imagery and estimating the depth of the water using digital elevation models (DEMs) is introduced. Finally, a technique for assessing building damage from airborne lidar point clouds is presented. All three methods are demonstrated using remotely sensed data that were collected in the wake of recent natural disasters. The research presented in this dissertation builds a case for the use of automatic, algorithmic analysis of road networks and buildings after a disaster. By reducing the latency between the disaster and the delivery of damage maps needed to make executive decisions about resource allocation and performing search and rescue missions, significant loss reductions could be achieved

Remote sensing-based proxies for urban disaster risk management and resilience: A review

© 2018 by the authors. Rapid increase in population and growing concentration of capital in urban areas has escalated both the severity and longer-term impact of natural disasters. As a result, Disaster Risk Management (DRM) and reduction have been gaining increasing importance for urban areas. Remote sensing plays a key role in providing information for urban DRM analysis due to its agile data acquisition, synoptic perspective, growing range of data types, and instrument sophistication, as well as low cost. As a consequence numerous methods have been developed to extract information for various phases of DRM analysis. However, given the diverse information needs, only few of the parameters of interest are extracted directly, while the majority have to be elicited indirectly using proxies. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the proxies developed for two risk elements typically associated with pre-disaster situations (vulnerability and resilience), and two post-disaster elements (damage and recovery), while focusing on urban DRM. The proxies were reviewed in the context of four main environments and their corresponding sub-categories: built-up (buildings, transport, and others), economic (macro, regional and urban economics, and logistics), social (services and infrastructures, and socio-economic status), and natural. All environments and the corresponding proxies are discussed and analyzed in terms of their reliability and sufficiency in comprehensively addressing the selected DRM assessments. We highlight strength and identify gaps and limitations in current proxies, including inconsistencies in terminology for indirect measurements. We present a systematic overview for each group of the reviewed proxies that could simplify cross-fertilization across different DRM domains and may assist the further development of methods. While systemizing examples from the wider remote sensing domain and insights from social and economic sciences, we suggest a direction for developing new proxies, also potentially suitable for capturing functional recovery

A Strategy Using Heritage Documentation for Managing Change of the Historic Centre of Bukhara

Bukhara, historic city of the Silk Roads, has been going through changes for more than 2000 years. The historic centre is UNESCO World Heritage since 1993 including hundreds of monuments such as madrassas, mosques and caravanserais, and an urban fabric containing the traditional Bukharian houses. As a dynamic city in Uzbekistan, its transformation is ongoing. A number of previous studies, including a large scale UNESCO field campaign, have been carried out to identify the overall condition of this historic city. Being most of the traditional houses privately owned and built of earthen materials, these studies have highlighted that this type of heritage is under threat of high impact of changes. Therefore, there has been a need of guidelines to protect and manage change of this outstanding heritage. Appropriate decisions in heritage conservation are based on timely, relevant and accurate information about the conditions, materials and evolution of heritage buildings and landscapes. To support these tasks, two main international projects, the University College London (UCL) Central Asian Archaeological Landscapes (CAAL) funded by Arcadia Fund, and the Traditional Bukharian Houses Documentation and Conservation approaches funded by the World Monuments Fund (WMF) are supporting the heritage management of city of Bukhara in partnership with the International Institute of Central Asian Studies (IICAS), the local administration, universities and the Bukharian community. This paper presents the current two large projects to create a digital database of the mahallas -neighbourhoods and its traditional houses by documenting heritage attributes, and ultimately produce the Guidelines on Conservation, Maintenance and Adaptive Reuse recognising heritage regeneration, as a core principle, and the contribution of heritage towards the achievement of the UN 2030 Agenda and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Improving Flood Detection and Monitoring through Remote Sensing

As climate-change- and human-induced floods inflict increasing costs upon the planet, both in terms of lives and environmental damage, flood monitoring tools derived from remote sensing platforms have undergone improvements in their performance and capabilities in terms of spectral, spatial and temporal extents and resolutions. Such improvements raise new challenges connected to data analysis and interpretation, in terms of, e.g., effectively discerning the presence of floodwaters in different land-cover types and environmental conditions or refining the accuracy of detection algorithms. In this sense, high expectations are placed on new methods that integrate information obtained from multiple techniques, platforms, sensors, bands and acquisition times. Moreover, the assessment of such techniques strongly benefits from collaboration with hydrological and/or hydraulic modeling of the evolution of flood events. The aim of this Special Issue is to provide an overview of recent advancements in the state of the art of flood monitoring methods and techniques derived from remotely sensed data

Urban morphology analysis by remote sensing and gis technique, case study: Georgetown, Penang

This paper was analysed the potential of applications of satellite remote sensing to urban planning research in urban morphology. Urban morphology is the study of the form of human settlements and the process of their formation and transformation. It is an approach in designing urban form that considers both physical and spatial components of the urban structure. The study conducted in Georgetown, Penang purposely main to identify the evolution of urban morphology and the land use expansion. In addition, Penang is well known for its heritage character, especially in the city of Georgetown with more than 200 years of urban history. Four series of temporal satellite SPOT 5 J on year 2004, 2007, 2009 and 2014 have been used in detecting an expansion of land use development aided by ERDAS IMAGINE 2014. Three types of land uses have been classified namely build-up areas, un-built and water bodies show a good accuracy with achieved above 85%. The result shows the built-up area significantly increased due to the rapid development in urban areas. Simultaneously, this study provides an understanding and strengthening a relation between urban planning and remote sensing applications in creating sustainable and resilience of the city and future societies as well

Application of innovative technologies in landslide research in the area of the City of Zagreb (Croatia, Europe)

This paper describes the application of innovative technologies for landslide detection, mapping and monitoring in the City of Zagreb since 2010. Airborne Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) data are used to visually identify landslides in the Podsljeme Zone over the area of 180 km2 for the purpose of landslide inventory mapping. The total number of landslides in the analyzed area (approx. 1,600 landslides) is estimated based on the average landslide density (9 landslides per square km) from the most reliable geomorphological historical inventory, which was produced in 1979. Examples of the visual interpretation of very-high-resolution bare-earth DEMs (Digital Elevation Model) are given to show the potential of these innovative techniques to identify the landslide contours of the very small, small and moderately small landslides that are characteristic of the study area, which is composed of engineering soils and/or soft rocks (marls). In the framework of the described landslide research, the biggest landslide in the Podsljeme Zone, the Kostanjek landslide (landslide area of 1 km2), was also equipped with an automated near-real time monitoring system that encompassed approximately 40 sensors to monitor landslide movement and landslide causal factors. Monitoring of this deep and large landslide during multiple extreme hydro-meteorological events from January 2013 to January 2015 enabled collection of data for the analysis of landslide movement on the surface and in the underground and as well as analysis of the relationship between landslide reactivations and its triggers, i.e., changes in groundwater level and precipitation. The final aim of the described scientific research in terms of landslide mapping and monitoring is its practical application in land-use planning and civil protection systems in the City of Zagreb. Namely, the conclusions propose reliable and efficient methods for landslide identification and monitoring, which are necessary to provide data and solutions for hazard and risk reduction to local authorities that are managed by the City

Environmental monitoring: landslide assessment and risk management (Test site: Vernazza, Cinque Terre Natural Park)

Natural disasters, whether of meteorological origin such as cyclones, floods, tornadoes and droughts or having geological nature such as earthquakes, volcanoes and landslide, are well known for their devastating impacts on human life, economy and environment. Over recent decades, the people and the societies are becoming more vulnerable; although the frequency of natural events may be constant, human activities contribute to their increased intensity. Indeed, every year millions of people are affected by natural disasters globally and, only in the last decade, more than 80% of all disaster-related deaths were caused by natural hazards. The PhD work is part of the activities for the support and development of methodologies useful to improve the management of environmental emergencies. In particular, it focused on the analysis of environmental monitoring and disaster risk management, a systematic approach to identify, to assess and to reduce the potential risks produced by a disaster. This method (Disaster Risk Management) aims to reduce socio-economic vulnerabilities and deals with natural and man-made events. In the PhD thesis, in particular, the slope movements have been evaluated. Slope failures are generally not so costly as earthquakes or major floods, but they are more widespread, and over the years may cause more property loss than any other geological hazard. In many developing regions slope failures constitute a continuing and serious impact on the social and economic structure. Specifically, the Italian territory has always been subject to instability phenomena, because of the geological and morphological characteristic and because of "extreme" weather events that are repeated more frequently than in the past, in relation to climate change. Currently these disasters lead to the largest number of victims and damages to settlements, infrastructure and historical and cultural environmental, after the earthquakes. The urban development, especially in recent decades, resulted in an increase of the assets at risk and unstable areas, often due to constant human intervention badly designed that led to instability also places previously considered "safe". Prevention is therefore essential to minimize the damages caused by landslides The objectives of the conducted research were to investigate the different techniques and to check their potentiality, in order to evaluate the most appropriate instrument for landslide hazard assessment in terms of better compromise between time to perform the analysis and expected results. The attempt is to evaluate which are the best methodologies to use according to the scenario, taking into consideration both reachable accuracies and time constraints. Careful considerations will be performed on strengths, weaknesses and limitations inherent to each methodology. The characteristics associated with geographic, or geospatial, information technologies facilitate the integration of scientific, social and economic data, opening up interesting possibilities for monitoring, assessment and change detection activities, thus enabling better informed interventions in human and natural systems. This is an important factor for the success of emergency operations and for developing valuable natural disaster preparedness, mitigation and prevention systems. The test site was the municipality of Vernazza, which in October 2011 was subject to a extreme rainfall which led to the occurrence of a series of landslides along the Vernazzola stream, which have emphasized the flood event that affected the water cours

Information modeling of earthquake-damaged reinforced concrete structures

Accurate and reliable information about buildings can greatly improve post-earthquake responses, such as search and rescue, repair and recovery. Building Information Modeling (BIM), rapid scanning and other assessment technologies offer the opportunity not only to retrieve as-built information but also to compile as-damaged models. This research proposes an information model to facilitate the data flow for post-earthquake assessment of reinforced concrete structures. The schema development was based on typical damage modes and the existing Industry Foundation Class (IFC) schema. Two examples of damaged structures from recent earthquake events, compiled using an experimental damage modeling software, illustrate the use of the data model. The model introduces two new classes, one to represent segments of building elements and the other to model the relationships between segments and cracks. A unique feature is the ability to model the process of damage with a binary tree structure. Methods for exporting as-damaged instance models using IFC are also discussed

Environmental monitoring: landslide assessment and risk management (Test site: Vernazza, Cinque Terre Natural Park)

Natural disasters, whether of meteorological origin such as cyclones, floods, tornadoes and droughts or having geological nature such as earthquakes, volcanoes and landslide, are well known for their devastating impacts on human life, economy and environment. Over recent decades, the people and the societies are becoming more vulnerable; although the frequency of natural events may be constant, human activities contribute to their increased intensity. Indeed, every year millions of people are affected by natural disasters globally and, only in the last decade, more than 80% of all disaster-related deaths were caused by natural hazards. The PhD work is part of the activities for the support and development of methodologies useful to improve the management of environmental emergencies. In particular, it focused on the analysis of environmental monitoring and disaster risk management, a systematic approach to identify, to assess and to reduce the potential risks produced by a disaster. This method (Disaster Risk Management) aims to reduce socio-economic vulnerabilities and deals with natural and man-made events. In the PhD thesis, in particular, the slope movements have been evaluated. Slope failures are generally not so costly as earthquakes or major floods, but they are more widespread, and over the years may cause more property loss than any other geological hazard. In many developing regions slope failures constitute a continuing and serious impact on the social and economic structure. Specifically, the Italian territory has always been subject to instability phenomena, because of the geological and morphological characteristic and because of "extreme" weather events that are repeated more frequently than in the past, in relation to climate change. Currently these disasters lead to the largest number of victims and damages to settlements, infrastructure and historical and cultural environmental, after the earthquakes. The urban development, especially in recent decades, resulted in an increase of the assets at risk and unstable areas, often due to constant human intervention badly designed that led to instability also places previously considered "safe". Prevention is therefore essential to minimize the damages caused by landslides The objectives of the conducted research were to investigate the different techniques and to check their potentiality, in order to evaluate the most appropriate instrument for landslide hazard assessment in terms of better compromise between time to perform the analysis and expected results. The attempt is to evaluate which are the best methodologies to use according to the scenario, taking into consideration both reachable accuracies and time constraints. Careful considerations will be performed on strengths, weaknesses and limitations inherent to each methodology. The characteristics associated with geographic, or geospatial, information technologies facilitate the integration of scientific, social and economic data, opening up interesting possibilities for monitoring, assessment and change detection activities, thus enabling better informed interventions in human and natural systems. This is an important factor for the success of emergency operations and for developing valuable natural disaster preparedness, mitigation and prevention systems. The test site was the municipality of Vernazza, which in October 2011 was subject to a extreme rainfall which led to the occurrence of a series of landslides along the Vernazzola stream, which have emphasized the flood event that affected the water course