Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay
Rising waters and land subsidence are increasing relative sea levels in western and northern Alaska, forcing communities to relocate or armor in place. To appropriately plan and make equitable decisions, there is a need to forecast the risk of flood exposure in coastal Alaskan communities and to eva...
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:7dc96e34ab2045829ef7ed833e5f429c 2023-05-15T15:16:46+02:00 Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay Anna Christina Miller Thomas Michael Ravens 2022-03-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.3390/jmse10030406 https://doaj.org/article/7dc96e34ab2045829ef7ed833e5f429c EN eng MDPI AG https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1312/10/3/406 https://doaj.org/toc/2077-1312 doi:10.3390/jmse10030406 2077-1312 https://doaj.org/article/7dc96e34ab2045829ef7ed833e5f429c Journal of Marine Science and Engineering, Vol 10, Iss 406, p 406 (2022) Alaska coastal flooding Alaska flood risk estimation and mitigation Naval architecture. Shipbuilding. Marine engineering VM1-989 Oceanography GC1-1581 article 2022 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.3390/jmse10030406 2022-12-31T03:58:11Z Rising waters and land subsidence are increasing relative sea levels in western and northern Alaska, forcing communities to relocate or armor in place. To appropriately plan and make equitable decisions, there is a need to forecast the risk of flood exposure in coastal Alaskan communities and to evaluate methods to mitigate that risk. This paper conducts use-inspired science to evaluate the current and future flood exposure of roads in Hooper Bay, Alaska, proposes a unit cost of flood exposure to estimate the cost of flooding, and compares various mitigation efforts including elevating roads and building dikes. Nine historic storms and their associated flood depths were subject to return-period analysis and modeled for several sea level rise scenarios. Based on the simulated road flood exposure (km hours/storm), and the storm-return period, an annual flood exposure (km hours/year) was computed. Then, the unit cost of flood exposure (USD/km hours) was determined as the ratio of the cost of flood mitigation (USD/year) to the annual flood exposure mitigated by the project. The analysis found that the unit cost of flood exposure, in conjunction with flood exposure calculations, does provide an approximate flood risk calculation, though a unitized cost of flood exposure needs to be divided into lump sum costs and materials costs. The analysis also found that dikes may be a more cost-effective alternative than road elevation. The flood risk calculation, based on the unit cost of flood exposure, could be made for all of the communities in a given region to identify those communities that face a high flood risk. Furthermore, if one divides the unit cost of flood exposure by the population, one obtains a cost/benefit ratio that potentially could be used to prioritize flood mitigation work. Article in Journal/Newspaper Arctic Alaska Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Arctic Journal of Marine Science and Engineering 10 3 406 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Alaska coastal flooding Alaska flood risk estimation and mitigation Naval architecture. Shipbuilding. Marine engineering VM1-989 Oceanography GC1-1581 |
spellingShingle |
Alaska coastal flooding Alaska flood risk estimation and mitigation Naval architecture. Shipbuilding. Marine engineering VM1-989 Oceanography GC1-1581 Anna Christina Miller Thomas Michael Ravens Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
topic_facet |
Alaska coastal flooding Alaska flood risk estimation and mitigation Naval architecture. Shipbuilding. Marine engineering VM1-989 Oceanography GC1-1581 |
description |
Rising waters and land subsidence are increasing relative sea levels in western and northern Alaska, forcing communities to relocate or armor in place. To appropriately plan and make equitable decisions, there is a need to forecast the risk of flood exposure in coastal Alaskan communities and to evaluate methods to mitigate that risk. This paper conducts use-inspired science to evaluate the current and future flood exposure of roads in Hooper Bay, Alaska, proposes a unit cost of flood exposure to estimate the cost of flooding, and compares various mitigation efforts including elevating roads and building dikes. Nine historic storms and their associated flood depths were subject to return-period analysis and modeled for several sea level rise scenarios. Based on the simulated road flood exposure (km hours/storm), and the storm-return period, an annual flood exposure (km hours/year) was computed. Then, the unit cost of flood exposure (USD/km hours) was determined as the ratio of the cost of flood mitigation (USD/year) to the annual flood exposure mitigated by the project. The analysis found that the unit cost of flood exposure, in conjunction with flood exposure calculations, does provide an approximate flood risk calculation, though a unitized cost of flood exposure needs to be divided into lump sum costs and materials costs. The analysis also found that dikes may be a more cost-effective alternative than road elevation. The flood risk calculation, based on the unit cost of flood exposure, could be made for all of the communities in a given region to identify those communities that face a high flood risk. Furthermore, if one divides the unit cost of flood exposure by the population, one obtains a cost/benefit ratio that potentially could be used to prioritize flood mitigation work. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Anna Christina Miller Thomas Michael Ravens |
author_facet |
Anna Christina Miller Thomas Michael Ravens |
author_sort |
Anna Christina Miller |
title |
Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
title_short |
Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
title_full |
Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
title_fullStr |
Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
title_full_unstemmed |
Assessing Coastal Road Flood Risk in Arctic Alaska, a Case Study from Hooper Bay |
title_sort |
assessing coastal road flood risk in arctic alaska, a case study from hooper bay |
publisher |
MDPI AG |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.3390/jmse10030406 https://doaj.org/article/7dc96e34ab2045829ef7ed833e5f429c |
geographic |
Arctic |
geographic_facet |
Arctic |
genre |
Arctic Alaska |
genre_facet |
Arctic Alaska |
op_source |
Journal of Marine Science and Engineering, Vol 10, Iss 406, p 406 (2022) |
op_relation |
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1312/10/3/406 https://doaj.org/toc/2077-1312 doi:10.3390/jmse10030406 2077-1312 https://doaj.org/article/7dc96e34ab2045829ef7ed833e5f429c |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3390/jmse10030406 |
container_title |
Journal of Marine Science and Engineering |
container_volume |
10 |
container_issue |
3 |
container_start_page |
406 |
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1766347063110402048 |