From Safety Against Floods to Safety at Floods*: Theory of Urban Resilience to Flood Adaptation and Synergy with Mitigation

Abstract

The intensity and frequency of flood are continuously increasing due to climate change. Cities across the world are susceptible to flood causing devastating damages to infrastructure and human life. Almost every country has taking measures to mitigate climate change primarily. However, due to urgency posed by climate change driven flood risk requires more holistic approach focusing on both mitigation and adaptation measures and synergy between these measures. Theory of urban resilience to flood has proposed a paradigm shift in response to flood by cities. Ecological resilience such as living with flood, nature-based solution for flood adaptation, and coping with flood due to community learning and experiences are more effective measures than engineering resilience, such as dykes, flood wall, dam, etc. This paper analyses critically the relevance of this theory and importance of level of resilience of cities for protection at flood rather than flood resistance.