Geography Of Hazards Research Articles

Income disparities and risk: Geographical manifestations of extreme inequities in the United States.

We examined hazard and risk-related metrics of the highest- and lowest-income counties and municipalities in each U.S. state. Indicators of natural and anthropogenic hazards, health outcomes, location of locally unwanted land uses, food insecurity, and other metrics were used to measure social and environmental justice. As expected, the highest-income places have better health outcomes, access to assets that protect health, and high municipal ratings of place quality compared with their poorest counterparts. Yet, they also have higher natural hazard risks and are more likely to live near concentrations of anthropogenic hazards. That is, high-income places have a lot to lose. Although the poorest jurisdictions demonstrate cumulative disadvantages, those in rural areas are exposed to less dense motor vehicle traffic and other hazards and risks associated with urban life. Relationships between income and the geography of hazards and risks are not simple. Even the highest-income areas face challenges. We suggest improvements in databases and tools to increase the focus on and monitoring of the breadth of risks people face in all areas.

Gathering places in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to introduce the concept of gathering places in disaster recovery, and describe types of active gathering places where residents and aid workers in Southern Texas, USA, came seeking resources, information and emotional support one month after Hurricane Harvey.Design/methodology/approachSemi-structured interviews in the field with 81 residents and 44 aid workers identified active gathering places and their functions. Researchers utilized a snowball sample design to identify and visit further gathering places until saturation. Field observations and a regional damage survey conducted by car add further context to interview data.FindingsIn total, 22 distinct types of gathering places were identified from the 123 unique gathering places documented. Overall, the displacement of residents created an obstacle to their recovery and access to resources and gathering places; residents characterized a lack of formalized emotional support centers – primarily relying on informal gatherings with friends and neighbors to meet their needs; and gathering places were limited in their ability to foster a communal recovery among the residents.Originality/valueThis study addresses a gap in the research, focusing on where and how individuals access resources, information and emotional support in the short-term recovery following a disaster event. This research combines two traditions, hazards geography and disaster sociology, to investigate what gathering places exist one month after a major disaster, where those places are located, and what purpose they serve.

Transit Systems and Ridership under Extreme Weather and Climate Change Stress: An Urban Transportation Agenda for Hazards Geography

AbstractThis review examines studies that detail the effects of weather and climate on urban transit systems and ridership. The aim is to help revitalize a hazards geography research agenda to support stakeholder decision‐making on hazard risk and disaster vulnerability for US transit systems and ridership. Largely representative of the literature are field perspectives outside of hazards geography whose predispositions to positivism neglect equity concerns of vital importance to hazard risk mitigation, vulnerability reduction, adaptation, and resilience research and practitioner communities. The article argues for hazards geography's perspectival insight to fill this void. Themes discussed in the article include hazards geography value, transit system vulnerability to meteorological and non‐meteorological factors, place‐based climate change vulnerability assessments, policymaker and managerial perceptions of climate change, and transit ridership choice. The article concludes with a call to hazards geographers to conduct critical assessments of structural and non‐structural adaptation measures, investigate mobility decision‐making and coping strategies, and develop theoretical understandings on adaptation policymaking and practice in relation to hazard risk and disaster vulnerability.

Research‐Based Decision Support in Hazard Mitigation: Louisiana Northshore Flood and Hurricane Protection

AbstractContinued population growth and development in exposed areas across Coastal Louisiana has created a new geography of hazards and disasters within the coastal zone. Increasing storm frequencies coupled with sea level rise will undoubtedly intensify the intersection between flood hazards and coastal residents. Accordingly, the baseline (inherent) capacity of places to adequately prepare for and rebound from disaster events will be negatively impacted. This paper summarizes the value of incorporating research‐based techniques into a non‐structural assessment of flood vulnerability within the Northshore Region of Louisiana. The exploratory nature of the methodology employed in this study was focused on determining the value of non‐structural measures of vulnerability in mitigation planning and the role of research in evidence‐based decision support for public officials. The outcome of the study highlighted new perspectives for measuring vulnerability within a policy environment, offering community officials a more robust understanding of the dynamic intersection of the physical threats, social vulnerability, and economic components of flood risk. This knowledge is currently being used by decision makers in the region to cultivate enhanced mitigation tactics that have traditionally been structurally focused. By incorporating the biophysical, economic, and social vulnerability into a qualitative “place” vulnerability matrix for the study area, the authors have been able to gain a more robust understanding of the flood risks across the region. By integrating this new understanding of risk into potential mitigation strategies, planning for risk reduction expenditures can more appropriately consider the drivers of place‐specific vulnerability.

Wildfire Research in an Environmental Hazards Course: An Active Learning Approach

Creating opportunities for students to actively apply hazards theory to real-life situations is often a challenge in hazards geography courses. This article presents a project, the Jocko Lakes Fire Project, that implemented learning strategies to encourage students to be active in wildfire hazards research. Wildfire hazards stand out as an increasing threat to communities in forested areas given current and projected rates of urbanization, the growing concentration of wealth in hazard-prone areas, the increasing costs of forest wildfire reduction, and climate change. Components of the project involved students in problem definition and the articulation of a research plan; identifying and collecting relevant data; and analyzing and documenting the wildfire hazard event. The student-based evaluation of the project and its outcomes highlights the ways in which this approach can increase understanding of local hazard scenarios, familiarity with relevant theory, geographical knowledge, and skills in research.

Teaching hazards by geographers: A decade of change

This paper reviews the status of college-level hazards courses and updates the findings of a survey conducted a decade earlier. The surveys sought information regarding hazards courses taught by geographers throughout the United States and Canada. Instructors were asked whether they emphasize physical or social aspects of hazards, what specific physical hazards and human response topics are considered, and what hazards models or paradigms are discussed, among other topics. Information was gathered about the instructors' education and their involvement in hazards research. The majority of instructors altered their courses in response to Hurricane Katrina, yet an emphasis upon physical aspects of hazards continued in many courses. Only slight changes were noted in coverage of many physical and social aspects of hazards. Discussion of models of human response to hazards decreased over the decade. Textbooks are increasingly authored by geologists. Geographers who are actively engaged in hazards research, as shown by graduate theses and dissertations, publication of journal articles reporting hazards research, presentation of hazards papers at professional meetings, membership of AAG Hazards specialty groups and subscriptions to Natural Hazards Observer, significantly differ from other instructors in their approaches to teaching hazards geography coursework. They typically spend more class time discussing social aspects of hazards and human response models in their classrooms.

Teaching Hazards Geography and Geographic Information Systems: A Middle School Level Experience

Teaching Hazards Geography and Geographic Information Systems: A Middle School Level Experience

Teaching Hazards Geography and Geographic Information Systems: A Middle School Level Experience

Hazards are taught with the belief that knowing something about their occurrence might help us avoid their consequences. The integrative nature of hazards – physical and social systems bound together – is attractive to the student and the instructor alike. Answering why we teach hazards is fairly straightforward. A more pressing question at present is this: how should we teach about hazards? To a large degree, attention towards how we teach hazards in a K-12 environment has been sparse. In this paper we explore the challenges faced when introducing hazards geography in a pre-collegiate setting. Following a review of the status of teaching hazards and the use of geographic information systems as an instructional aid, we outline a hazards course taught successfully for middle school students and discuss implementation obstacles for the traditional classroom.

Linking Access and Vulnerability: Perceptions of Irrigation and Flood Management in Pakistan

This article reports the results of a survey conducted in four villages in central Pakistan regarding people's perceptions about irrigation- and flood-related issues. The article uses the perception studies methodology from the human ecology school to address the political ecology agenda in resource and hazards geography. The log-linear analysis of the survey data shows that people are knowledgeable about social power differentials and interactions between various social factors in influencing their access to resources and vulnerability to floods. The article further demonstrates that water users and vulnerable populations are much more likely to suggest social explanations than naturalistic or fatalistic explanations for their differential access to irrigation water and vulnerability to flood hazard.

Changing directions in hazards geography

Changing directions in hazards geography