9 research outputs found
Built-in resilience through disaster risk reduction: operational issues
It has been argued that the broad range of people responsible for the delivery, operation and maintenance of the built environment need to become more proactively involved in making the built environment resilient to a wide range of known and unforeseen hazards and threats. Accordingly, the (actual and potential) roles of a wide range of stakeholders associated with the integration of Disaster Risk Reduction into the (re-)development of the built environment are examined. A review of literature, government data and interviews with key stakeholders in England, highlights that despite regulatory intentions to increase local resilience through the use of public and private sector stakeholders, a number of structural and operational obstacles exist. A range of strategies can be employed to overcome these obstacles: revisions to building codes, tightening planning policy, improving professional training, clarifying roles and missions, enabling complementary bottom-up and top-down approaches, and the provision of good practice guidance about the broad range of structural and non-structural risk reduction measures. Many of the operational challenges are non-structural and require a coherent, overarching strategy: changing and aligning the social understandings and practices in civil society, government and building environment stakeholders
DecisionâSupport System Portal as a tool for mainstreaming DRR into urban decision making
Recent disasters such as Super Storm Sandy, the Haitian Earthquake and extensive floods across the United Kingdom have highlighted the fragility of cities to a range of hazards and threats thus emphasizing the increasing importance of resilience and disaster risk reduction (DRR) and the influences of such concepts upon the management of the built environment. While this makes the role of planning, design and construction stakeholders crucial in implementing the principles of DRR, tensions exist regarding the extent to which DRR measures should be implemented during planning, design and construction process; in particular who should be responsible for the implementation of such measures. This paper presents a web-based Decision-Support System Portal (DSSP) developed during a four-year European Union-funded project which is examining the design and planning of safer urban spaces. Central to the project is an integrated security and resilience (ISR) design framework that engages local stakeholders for identifying vulnerabilities and improving urban spaces with respect to âsecurity threatsâ. The DSSP helps end-users better understand the vulnerabilities and design possibilities of the proposed site by allowing users to pursue decision-support scenarios of secure urban design and planning
Water resource assessment of karst islands and the development of a freshwater lens assessment protocol
Karst islands like those found in the Philippine Archipelago present extreme challenges for stakeholders to manage their water resources in a sustainable manner. Anthropogenic Climate Change, land development, point source pollution and increased population have all combined to alter the water balance on these fragile islands. Karst features, shallow depth to groundwater and the potential for dissolution, contribute greatly to these challenges. Combined, these factors pose an array of complex
research questions. A field reconnaissance and semi-structured interviews were completed on Bantayan
Island in 2016. Drawing upon current groundwater characterization practices the research posits a novel approach for these hydrogeologic environs. With the application of the Freshwater Lens Assessment Protocol (FLAP) credible output for the characterization of the islands groundwater resources will be
determined and integrated into an Adaptive Water Resource Management framework, empowering stakeholders to make informed decisions on sustainable abstraction strategies
Engineering design for dwellings and small housing in seismically active regions of Pakistan : towards a more holistic approach
This paper is an outcome of a 3 year research link programme. Over a period of time several
people have contributed towards the development of the ideas. It is difficult to acknowledge all. For
the production of this paper Dr Lee Bosher, Dr M.Sohail, Professor Lodi and Professor Rafeeqi
have contributed.
âEarthquakes donât kill people: buildings doâ1. The earthquake in October 2005 in Kashmir and
northern parts of Pakistan once again highlighted the unresolved issue of poor design and quality
of buildings, especially non-engineered buildings and infrastructure2. This paper introduces the
âHolistic Engineering Designâ (HED) project that aims to ensure that best practice in the design and
construction of resilient informal (non-engineered) buildings in seismically active areas can be
more widely achieved. In doing so, the proposed project will address key questions about the
technical, financial and social feasibility of current practice and possible seismic hazard
engineering measures; including the potential to learn lessons from traditional construction
techniques and âprofessional wisdomâ; this is what the authors have referred to as a âholistic
approachâ to engineering design. This paper highlights the main issues globally regarding the
engineering design of dwellings and small housing in seismic zones before defining and
considering the case for a more holistic approach in Pakistan
Stimulating resilience for recovery: building adaptive resilience in emergency WASH response in Haiti, the Philippines and Lebanon
Recovery deficits are often witnessed within disaster-affected societies following post-disaster
interventions. Humanitarian operations have struggled to find coherence between relief and recovery
activities, which has resulted in a perceived operational âgapâ between relief, recovery and development.
Building individual/household resilience within the humanitarian sphere has been theoretically posed to be
fundamental for recovery; a programmatic consideration that could ensure former weak resilience would
not hinder post-disaster recovery. Therefore, could a resilience building approach offer much needed
solutions to the challenge of recovery within post-disaster contexts? This paper will present findings from
recent doctoral research undertaken in the 2010 Haiti earthquake response, as well as presenting case
study evidence from the 2013 post-disaster responses in the Philippines and the Syrian response in
Lebanon. The paper will look specifically at the common barriers to recovery experienced by individuals/
households in a crisis event, understanding how emergency response operations within the WASH sector
affects recovery, individual/ household resilience within the post-disaster environment will be detailed,
gauging its relevance for stimulating recovery; giving case study examples of how in practice resilience at
the individual/ household level can be operationalised in emergency response programming
Preventing catastrophic events in construction
The construction industry recognises the hazardous nature of its activities, which can be seen in the high toll of accidents its workers suffer compared with other industries - ranging from lost time injuries to fatalities. There is also a high incidence of ill-health among construction workers, including fatal diseases such as cancer arising from asbestos exposure. However, the industry may not be sufficiently aware of the potential for it to be associated with more major or catastrophic events (those involving multiple deaths and/or significant damage to property and infrastructure).
Larger construction organisations have been applying âholisticâ risk management techniques to manage project risk. Low probability but high-consequence issues have often been included in these considerations. Most issues addressed have had purely commercial consequences eg sudden loss of a major contract or customer. However, some issues do have significant health and safety implications.
This project has examined these âlow probability but high-consequenceâ safety hazards by looking at:
n the types of catastrophic event which have occurred or which might occur during construction; n the reasons for occurrence when there have been (or could have been) catastrophic events during
construction, including an examination of the underlying factors; n the controls which should contribute to an avoidance of a catastrophic event; and n where the UK construction industry could improve. This report and the work it describes were funded by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Its contents, including any opinions and/or conclusions expressed, are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect HSE policy
Tensions and complexities in creating a sustainable and resilient built environment: achieving a turquoise agenda in the UK
The paradigms of sustainability and resilience have significant impacts on both research and practice in the built environment, framing ethical postures towards the fragile relationships between the built, the natural and the social environments. Both paradigms adopt a systems approach to the understanding and the embracing of complexity, highlighting the importance of long-term effects and a holistic view of highly interconnected variables. However, a careful look at policies shows that these paradigms also emphasize diverging priorities and relationships, and that there is often a prioritization of one agenda over another. Such tensions create increased complexity in policy and decision-making, potentially undermining both agendas. In this paper we examine the tensions and compatibilities between these agendas through an analysis of 43 UK policy documents, and 21 interviews with stakeholders involved in the planning, design, construction and operation of the built environment. Our analysis reveals a series of recurrent tensions that occur when theoretical approaches are translated into the âgreenâ (sustainable) and âblueâ (resilience) agendas. Incapable of dealing with this increased complexity, decision and policy makers simplify and âinstrumentaliseâ several core principles, creating additional tensions. Rather than determining objective concepts that decision-makers can directly translate into action, both paradigms lead stakeholders to create their own dynamic representations and meanings in an iterative process influenced by theory and practice. The findings have both theoretical and practical implications. Conceptually, they help to draw clearer boundaries between the two paradigms. In practice, they show that narrow and simplistic representations of these paradigms make it difficult to reconcile the two agendas. The paper raises important questions as to the plausibility of a âturquoiseâ agenda, and suggests the need for a more nuanced representation of the two paradigms
Flood impacts on emergency responders operating at a city-scale
Emergency responders often have to operate and respond to emergency situations during dynamic weather conditions, including floods. This paper demonstrates a novel method using existing tools and datasets to evaluate emergency responder accessibility during flood events within the City of Leicester, UK. Accessibility was quantified using the 8- and 10-minute legislative targets for emergency provision for the Ambulance and Fire & Rescue services respectively under ânormalâ, no flood conditions, as well as flood scenarios of various magnitudes (namely the 1 in 20 year-, 1 in 100-year and 1 in 1,000-year recurrence intervals), with both surface
water and fluvial flood conditions considered. Flood restrictions were processed based on previous hydrodynamic inundation modelling undertaken and inputted into a Network Analysis framework as restrictions for surface water and fluvial flood events. Surface water flooding was shown to cause more disruption to emergency responders operating within the city due to its widespread and spatially distributed footprint when compared to fluvial flood events of comparable magnitude. Fire & Rescue 10-minute accessibility was shown to
decrease from 100 %, 66.5 %, 39.8 % and 26.2 % under the no flood, 1 in 20-year, 1 in 100-year and 1 in 1,000- year surface water flood scenarios respectively. Furthermore, total inaccessibility was shown to increase with flood magnitude, increasing from 6.0 % to 31.0 % under the 1 in 20-year and 1 in 100-year surface water flooding scenarios respectively. Further, the evolution of emergency service accessibility through a surface water flood event is outlined, demonstrating the rapid onset of impacts on emergency service accessibility within the first 15-minutes of the surface water flood event, with a reduction in service coverage and overlap being witnessed for the Ambulance service under a 1 in 100-year flood event. The study provides evidence to
guide strategic planning for decision makers prior to and during emergency response to flood events at the cityscale and provides a readily transferable method to explore the impacts of natural hazards or disruptions on
additional cities or regions based on historic, scenario-based events or real-time forecasting if such data is available
Guidance on catastrophic events in construction
This guide is based upon a research project carried out for the HSE by CIRIA, working
in partnership with Loughborough University. The research was reported to the HSE
and was published by the HSE as Research Report RR834 Preventing catastrophic events
in construction. The text in this guide is substantially drawn from RR834