New York City, a global centre of business and finance, was brought to a complete standstill by Hurricane Sandy on the night of 29 October. Several weeks later there were still 80,000 people without power and many storm-damaged schools, hospitals and subways remained out of action.
The impact of this event, estimated to cost over £30 billion, will put yet more pressure on civil engineers to make infrastructure systems less vulnerable to natural and man-made hazards.
ICE journal special issue
ICE has just published a special issue (165 CE6) of its Civil Engineering journal on how to improve infrastructure resilience.
Brian Neale of the Hazards Forum says in his introduction, ‘This special issue of Civil Engineering explores resilience for a number of different types of infrastructures, geographical locations and perspectives – all with a view to helping improve serviceability levels and expectations.’
Expectation vs. investment
He adds that society has a right to expect more resilient infrastructure from civil engineers, but equally the profession needs to do more to help society understand what performance levels can be expected for a given level of investment.
Topics of papers covered in the issue include the principles of resilient design, how to design for high-impact low-chance risks, the hazards of climate change and the importance of community resilience. Case studies include road and drainage networks, British railway infrastructure, South African water resources and Pacific island flood defences.
For more information, please contact the ICE Proceedings editor Simon Fullalove on +44 20 7665 2448 or at editor@ice.org.uk.