A Comprehensive Suitability Analysis for Disaster Emergency Shelters -A Case Study of New York City- Ha Hwang University at Buffalo Jiyoung Park Sungkyunkwan University 1

Research Background Recent US hurricanes HurricaneYearFatalities*Damage**Location Sandy ,400Most of theUnited States East Coast Irene ,800Caribbean, East Coast of the United States, Eastern Canada Ike ,500Texas, Louisiana Rita ,000Louisiana Katrina20051,836108,000Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, and Ohio Ivan ,800Texas; Florida * Number of people, ** US Million dollars Source:  Mitigation measures and recovery system improvements after Hurricane Katrina in the United States. 2

Research Background Disaster management – Control for disasters and emergency situations Disaster Management  Disaster emergency shelter is a branch of preparedness phase Source: 3

Research Background Most of disaster shelter studies have focused on “Optimal Allocation” Identification of “Locational Suitability” on candidate shelters must be preceded. 4 Candidate Shelters Locational Suitability Locational Optimization

Research Purpose Building a comprehensive framework in order to identify locational suitability for disaster emergency shelters – Only handful of empirical studies focus on specific local context. Two purposes of this study 1.Developing a comprehensive framework for locational suitability identification with suitability indices. 2.Apply the proposed framework to NYC as a case study to assess the proposed framework. 5

Define Disaster Emergency Shelters What can we plan? Shelters? Relatives’ homes Friends’ homes Hotels/Motels … Public Shelters We cannot plan these locations…  We can plan these locations! 6

Suitability Indices 1.Social Vulnerability – Close to the people who have higher probability of going to disaster emergency shelters 2.Physical Proximity – Close to major facilities which support principle functions of shelters 3.Spatial Feasibility – Utilizable for public purposes 7

Locational Suitability of Disaster Emergency Shelters “Social Vulnerability” + “Physical Accessibility” + “Spatial Availability” 8 Likelihood of people, who evacuate to public shelters Accessibility to major facilities to support Shelter operation Excluding unavailable area for public shelter locations

1. Social Vulnerability Who is more likely to evacuate? – People stay at home when they don’t know… (Whitehead et al., 2000) How severe a disaster is. Where to go. How to get there. – Likelihood of evacuation Mobile home residents are more likely to evacuate due to the instability of house structure. (Whitehead. et. al., 2000) Minorities, young children, and the elderly are consistently more likely to evacuate (Bolin, 1982; Drabek & Boggs, 1968; Perry & Mushkatel, 2008; Quarantelli, 1960; Whitehead et al., 2000) Pet owners, women, and more educated people are not likely evacuate. (Whitehead. et. al., 2000) 9

1. Social Vulnerability Who goes to public shelters? – Public shelter is not a popular choice “No one planned to, or actually did, stay in one [a public shelter] during the evacuation.” (Kang et al., 2007, p.899) – Why? uncleanliness, chaos, inconvenience, no pet allowed, … Public shelters are safe spots for minorities – Who cannot evacuate quickly and far away. – Who have nowhere to go. 10

1. Social Vulnerability Demographic difference between the people who evacuate to hotels/motels and public shelters – Race (Mesa-Arango et al., 2012) – Income (Moore et al., 1963; Mileti et al., 1992; Kar & Hodgson, 2008; Mesa-Arango et al., 2012;) Other issues – Identity – Pet owners – Time of evacuation – Degree of risk perception – Availability of public shelters – Proportion of the population evacuated 11

2. Physical Accessibility Accessibility to major roads and highway interchanges – Providing foods, water, and basic necessaries – Be well-known to people Accessibility to hospitals – Support medical emergencies in cooperation with close hospitals Proximity to other proposed shelter sites – Extra shelter locations for auxiliary shelters in case of surplus evacuees – In this case, the original shelter locations function as local hub shelters that distribute evacuees. 12

3. Spatial Availability Avoid disaster sources – 100 year flooding zones – Hurricane Evacuation Zones (HEZ) Public availability – Public facilities and institutions – Open spaces and outdoor recreation facilities – Parking facilities – Transportation utilities – Vacant land 13

LUCIS Land Use Conflict Identification Strategy (LUCIS) – Raster-based suitability analysis model – Combine diverse variables into three (or more) indices – Represent three ranking variables into one number 14

NYC Hurricane Evacuation Shelters Source: Costal Storm Plan. NYC Note: ESF= Emergency Supporting Function 15

Evacuation Centers in NYC 64 Evacuation Centers 16

Suitability Indices and Variables 17

Conceptual Framework 18

LUCIS Results 19

Framework Evaluation Table. Proportion and number of evacuation centers of NYC in each suitability value 20

Framework Evaluation Table. Evacuation Centers out of Suitability Analysis Area 21 Data Verification – CUNY definitely is a public college. New Category for Property Owner Types – Some types of private properties can be used as public emergency shelters upon public-private agreements. Flexibility on the lot size – Minimum lot size can be eased in NYC, because hurricane evacuation centers function as distribution centers.

Refined Framework 22

Result Interpretation How to interpret the map? – It is definitely true that “333” is the 1 st priority. – “233” and “133” would be the 2 nd and 3 rd priorities. There would be some people who will go to evacuation shelter from the area of having S.V.I. as “2” or “1”, since aggregated data were used. – Subsequent priorities would vary – Flexible interpretation should be followed for making decisions based on data, local context, available resources, and etc. 23

Issues to be discussed How to allocate disaster emergency shelters on the proposing suitable locations? – Total Travel Time Minimization – Locational Optimization – Coverage Area How to cover the area where has no suitable area nearby? – Lack of Available Area (Public-Private Agreements) – More vulnerable area, need longer evacuation time (Evacuation Training and Education, Early Warning) 24