Urban Resilience to Flooding in Asia's Vulnerable Cities: Shanghai, Dhaka, Tokyo, and Taipei

Abstract

Most of flooding hotspots by 2025 will be located in Asian nations (United Nations 2012). Damages from flooding will increase in correlation with increasing urbanization, risk, exposure, and vulnerability in Asia. Currently, four Asian cities, Shanghai, Dhaka, Tokyo, and Taipei, are the most vulnerable cities to flooding. In Shanghai or Dhaka, approximately 50% of its land is in flood-prone areas, the highest vulnerability to floods among coastal cities. Tokyo is one of the most populous urban agglomeration in Asia, with a population of over 37 million. Extensive urbanization in Tokyo suffers from severe damages once flooding occurs. In Taipei, flood-prone areas account for approximately 41% of its total land area in an extreme weather scenario. How and what planners can do to reduce the impact of flooding is an important consideration. Similarly, how governments prepare and plan for a resilient city should be a priority for many policy makers. In the future, rather than strengthening and rebuilding costly structures, Asian cities should focus on land-use and environmental planning for resilience as well as strengthening their organizations and funding to reduce disaster risk, maintain up-to-date risk and vulnerability assessment. Urban policies should include environmentally responsible development in the face of continued population and economic growth, and being resilient regarding natural disasters. Asian cities can adopt a growth management policy to direct development away from flooding hotspots. Urban regeneration policy should require developers to improve storm sewers, water retention ponds, and permeable surfaces. Planning more space for rivers, more constructed wetlands, and more ecological ponds to accommodate water is important. Cities can promote an actuarially fair flood insurance program which can reflect actual flood risks. A bottom-up community resilience plan would assist achieving urban resilience in Asian cities. Most important is the need of a strong political commitment and leadership to initiate and implement urban policies toward resilience. In doing so, urban resilience can be achieved in Asian cities.