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The University of Southampton
Geography and Environmental Science

Flood risk management: comparing approaches in the US and the EU  Seminar

Time:
16:00
Date:
21 February 2018
Venue:
Shackleton Building 44, Lecture Theatre B

For more information regarding this seminar, please email Dr Nathaniel Lewis at N.M.Lewis@soton.ac.uk .

Event details

During the second half of the 20th century, physical exposure to the risk of flooding has increased dramatically in the US and in the EU, mainly because of the occupation and transformation of flood-prone land. However, this trend has been attenuated by a greater social capacity to absorb losses and by the increased effectiveness of flood management measures. Unfortunately, technological improvements in hydraulic infrastructures have also fostered the notion that people can be completely safe from flood risks. This has resulted in some people abrogating responsibility for their individual actions or for taking steps to lessen residual risk, having catastrophic consequences such as Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in 2005 or Hurricane Xynthia in La Faute-sur-Mer, France, in 2010. Taking examples from the US and France this presentation will open the debate on what is the right set of measures to manage flood risk and it will focus on the importance of land use management.

Speaker information

Anna Serra-LLobet, University of California-Berkeley Institute of Urban and Regional Development. Visiting Scholar

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