Characterization of the Inherent Resilience of Large Cities to Natural Hazards

Abstract

In view that cities will continue to house the majority of the world’s population at an increasing rate in the face of climate change, this paper studies urban resilience by examining the response history of the mean-square displacement of the citizens of large cities prior to and upon historic natural hazards strike. The recorded mean-square displacements of large numbers of cellphone users from the cities of Houston, Miami, and Jacksonville when struck by hurricanes Harvey 2017, Irma 2017, and Dorian 2019 together with the recorded mean-square displacements of the citizens of Dallas and Houston when experiencing the 2021 North American winter storm suggest that large cities of average population density when struck by natural hazards are inherently resilient. The recorded mean-square displacements presented in this study also validate a mechanical model for cities, previously developed by the authors, that is rooted in Langevin dynamics and predicts that following a natural hazard, large cities revert immediately to their initial steady-state behavior and resume their normal, preevent activities. The inherent ability of large American cities to revert to their normal, preevent, steady-state response as evidenced in this study by the recorded mean-square displacement of their citizens needs to be further explored for other cities around the world with different resources, and socioeconomic structures.