Abstract
In 2016, 192 cities, including Wuhan, Nanjing, and Jiujiang, suffered from severe flooding, which raised social and government concerns in China. This paper proposes a method based on the underlying surface to estimate the urban flood-carrying capacity. First, water is extended into the underlying surface vegetation-impervious surface-soil (VIS) model to form the vegetation-impervious surface-soil and water (VIS-W) model. Second, the watershed is delimitated using a digital elevation model (DEM). Third, the natural water system’s storage capacity, including rivers, lakes, and puddles, is estimated. Using the rainfall–runoff hydrology model and the VIS-W model, the storing ability, the receiving ability, the discharge potential, and the emergency of pumping outward are assessed to derive the final flood-carrying capacity. Finally, the result is compared with data on the waterlogging points collected in July 2016 during a flood and waterlogging event in Wuhan. It is found that 84% of waterlogging points are located in the “weak” or “normal” areas, and 16% are located in the “strong” areas. Additionally, 99% of total waterlogging points are located upstream, based on the stream extracted by the DEM. This phenomenon indicates that Wuhan can mitigate flood disasters by fully utilizing the natural water system storage capacity to corporate the city’s drainage schedule.
Highlights
In recent years, China has faced serious challenges in terms of flood and waterlogging disasters.According to the Global Disaster Annual Report, the World Health Organization (WHO) pointed out that in 2016 China experienced its fifth highest number of natural disasters in the last decade, and was affected by 16 floods and landslides in that year [1]
Related to the previous research, we used a refined digital elevation model (DEM) by water body for watershed delimitation, since the performances will increase the certainty of flow direction and improve the accuracy of the delimited watershed compared to the original DEM [42]
According to the proposed model, the urban flood-carrying capacity can be derived by the storing ability, the receiving ability, the drainage potential, and the pumping emergency
Summary
China has faced serious challenges in terms of flood and waterlogging disasters. According to the Global Disaster Annual Report, the World Health Organization (WHO) pointed out that in 2016 China experienced its fifth highest number of natural disasters in the last decade, and was affected by 16 floods and landslides in that year [1]. Taking Wuhan as an example, the imperious surface increased from 903.45 km to 3989.49 km from 2010 to 2016 [10].
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