A review of flood vulnerability indices for coastal cities

Abstract

Abstract Combinations of qualitative and quantitative indicators are increasingly used to identify vulnerability to hazard events around the world. This chapter focuses specifically on vulnerability indices designed to measure vulnerability to coastal flooding in urbanized areas and provides a critical review of 24 coastal flood vulnerability assessments related to the design and implementation of these indices in order to determine overarching conceptual groupings and their relevance. Results show that a great deal of variability exists across indices in terms of the area of interest scale (ranging from nation to city) and unit of analysis scale (ranging from county to grid cell). Furthermore, sampled assessments are roughly split between focus on vulnerability as a physical phenomenon and as a social condition exacerbated by physical phenomena. Indicators across the sampled literature are grouped according to their relation to social, economic, institutional, environmental, built environment, and hazard-specific themes. This review of existing methods will provide the foundation for a summary of the field of flood vulnerability index creation, including a comparative analysis of the applicability of indicators across categories and their relation to the priorities outlined in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.