Developing Sustainable Planning for Heritage Conservation in the Tropics: A Gis-Based Risk and Vulnerability Assessment Profile for Historic Archives in Puerto Rico

Vega, Johnny Lugo; Díaz, Daniel

doi:10.2495/sdp180521

Cited by 2 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…Earth 2024, 5, FOR PEER REVIEW 4 Due to PR's topography (an elevated center and low coastlines), climate classification (Af and Am in Köppen-Geiger classification) [17], and geographical location in the Atlantic Ocean, PR is prone to landslides and floods during the wet season. Urban coastal areas in PR are close to alluvial landforms and are classified as flood risk areas [18]. The results of a study that assessed agricultural activity in PR from 2012 to 2018, after the effects of major atmospheric events, showed that Hurricanes Irma and Maria (2017) destroyed many agricultural fields, which affected the agricultural sector, particularly small farms of local producers [19].…”

Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience of an Urban Coastal Ecosystem in the Caribbean: A Remote Sensing Approach in Western Puerto Rico

Bonilla-Roman,

Acuña-Guzman

2024

Earth

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Utilization of remote sensing-derived meteorological data is a valuable alternative for tropical insular territories such as Puerto Rico (PR). The study of ecosystem resilience in insular territories is an underdeveloped area of investigation. Little research has focused on studying how an ecosystem in PR responds to and recovers from unique meteorological events (e.g., hurricanes). This work aims to investigate how an ecosystem in Western Puerto Rico responds to extreme climate events and fluctuations, with a specific focus on evaluating its innate resilience. The Antillean islands in the Caribbean and Atlantic are vulnerable to intense weather phenomena, such as hurricanes. Due to the distinct tropical conditions inherent to this region, and the ongoing urban development of coastal areas, their ecosystems are constantly affected. Key indicators, including gross primary production (GPP), normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), actual evapotranspiration (ET), and land surface temperature (LST), are examined to comprehend the interplay between these factors within the context of the Culebrinas River Watershed (CRW) ecosystem over the past decade during the peak of hurricane season. Data processing and analyses were performed on datasets provided by Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Landsat 8–9 OLI TRIS, supplemented by information sourced from Puerto Rico Water and Energy Balance (PRWEB)—a dataset derived from Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) data. The findings revealed a complex interrelationship among atmospheric events and anthropogenic activities within the CRW, a region prone to recurrent atmospheric disruptions. NDVI and ET values from 2015 to 2019 showed the ecosystem’s capacity to recover after a prolonged drought period (2015) and Hurricanes Irma and Maria (2017). In 2015, the NDVI average was 0.79; after Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017, the NDVI dropped to 0.6, while in 2019, it had already increased to 0.8. Similarly, average ET values went from 3.2339 kg/m2/day in 2017 to 2.6513 kg/m2/day in 2018. Meanwhile, by 2019, the average ET was estimated to be 3.8105 kg/m2/day. Data geoprocessing of LST, NDVI, GPP, and ET, coupled with correlation analyses, revealed positive correlations among ET, NDVI, and GPP. Our results showed that areas with little anthropogenic impact displayed a more rapid and resilient restoration of the ecosystem. The spatial distribution of vegetation and impervious surfaces further highlights that areas closer to mountains have shown higher resilience while urban coastal areas have faced greater challenges in recovering from atmospheric events, thus showing the importance of preserving native vegetation, particularly mangroves, for long-term ecosystem stability. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of the dynamic interactions within urban coastal ecosystems in insular territories, emphasizing their resilience in the context of both natural atmospheric events and human activity. The insights gained from this research offer valuable guidance for managing and safeguarding ecosystems in similar regions characterized by their susceptibility to extreme weather phenomena.

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Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 99%

Resilience of an Urban Coastal Ecosystem in the Caribbean: A Remote Sensing Approach in Western Puerto Rico

Bonilla-Roman,

Acuña-Guzman

2024

Earth

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“…The topic of human responses covers several types of measures for cities and their residents to respond to wind hazards, especially to hurricanes. First, cities respond to hazards through evaluating risks, reducing vulnerabilities, and building resilience [161][162][163][164][165]. Second, estimates on total death during or after hurricanes are made to help provide adequate support to vulnerable populations [166,167].…”

Section: Plos Onementioning

confidence: 99%

Wind disasters adaptation in cities in a changing climate: A systematic review

et al. 2021

PLoS ONE

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Wind-related disasters will bring more devastating consequences to cities in the future with a changing climate, but relevant studies have so far provided insufficient information to guide adaptation actions. This study aims to provide an in-depth elaboration of the contents discussed in open access literature regarding wind disaster adaptation in cities. We used the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) to refine topics and main contents based on 232 publications (1900 to 2019) extracted from Web of Science and Scopus. We conducted a full-text analysis to filter out focal cities along with their adaptation measures. The results show that wind disaster adaptation research in cities has formed a systematic framework in four aspects: 1) vulnerability and resilience of cities, 2) damage evaluation, 3) response and recovery, and 4) health impacts of wind disaster. Climate change is the background for many articles discussing vulnerability and adaptation in coastal areas. It is also embedded in damage evaluation since it has the potential to exacerbate disaster consequences. The literature is strongly inclined towards more developed cities such as New York City and New Orleans, among which New York City associated with Hurricane Sandy ranks first (38/232). Studies on New York City cover all the aspects, including the health impacts of wind disasters which are significantly less studied now. Distinct differences do exist in the number of measures regarding the adaptation categories and their subcategories. We also find that hard adaptation measures (i.e., structural and physical measures) are far more popular than soft adaptation measures (i.e., social and institutional measures). Our findings suggest that policymakers should pay more attention to cities that have experienced major wind disasters other than New York. They should embrace the up-to-date climate change study to defend short-term disasters and take precautions against long-term changes. They should also develop hard-soft hybrid adaptation measures, with special attention on the soft side, and enhance the health impact study of wind-related disasters.

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Developing Sustainable Planning for Heritage Conservation in the Tropics: A Gis-Based Risk and Vulnerability Assessment Profile for Historic Archives in Puerto Rico

Cited by 2 publications

References 5 publications

Resilience of an Urban Coastal Ecosystem in the Caribbean: A Remote Sensing Approach in Western Puerto Rico

Resilience of an Urban Coastal Ecosystem in the Caribbean: A Remote Sensing Approach in Western Puerto Rico

Wind disasters adaptation in cities in a changing climate: A systematic review

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