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Disaster risk: Conditions, trends and impacts185Box 7.9 Disaster risk in a small city: Shimla, IndiaShimla is a small settlement in India, with a population of 140,000.The city is located in the north Indian Himalayas in an area of highseismic activity. On 4 April 1905, an earthquake of 7.8 on theRichter scale damaged much of the city. While the city wasdesigned for 25,000 occupants, it now houses up to 140,000 aspermanent residents and another 100,000 transitory population.Urban development has proceeded apace and without due regardfor hazard management. Risk has accumulated as the city hasdeveloped.Capacity for urban planning has not been able to keep pacewith development, although recent initiatives have built disastermanagement capacity. The non-governmental organization (NGO)Sustainable Environment and Ecological Development Society hasworked with the municipal corporation of Shimla to buildresilience. An earthquake risk assessment has been conducted thathas flagged several urban processes as contributing to risk:• Rapid unplanned growth has occurred so that residentialdistricts – but also critical infrastructure (e.g. hospitals, powerstations, telecommunication installations and water supplystations) are located in hazard zones.• Most buildings are residential (over 75 per cent) and the city ishigh density. Both of these factors limit the amount of sparecapacity space that could be used for public shelter in theevent of a large disaster.Source: Gupta et al, 2006• Many of the buildings are not accessible from roads (72 percent) and many are on steep hill slopes, making evacuation andrelief difficult.• Emergency services are under-funded. Only 100 fire fighterswith six fire engines serve the city and its surrounding region.• The building stock is predominantly of a poor condition.Existing building stock is poorly maintained, particularly in therental sector, coupled with a preference for building withunsafe material, such as brick or concrete with minimalreinforcement. Some 36 per cent of the city’s building stockhas been classified by the Sustainable Environment andEcological Development Society as being of very poor quality.• Many buildings are inappropriately high for an earthquakeregion. At least 24 per cent of buildings have three or morestories, 40 per cent of which are built on steep slopes on topof un-compacted soil.• Around 15 per cent of Shimla’s building stock was constructedbefore 1925 and is built of wood. This is a concern for half ofthese structures, which have not been properly maintained,leading to decay. In the old districts of the town, the highdensity of building means that adjoining buildings are put atrisk.• Seismic building codes were introduced in 1971. About 30 percent of the buildings were constructed before this ordinancewas passed; but a lack of regulation enforcement means thatsome 80 per cent of buildings do not meet standards.Environmental change and poverty in citiesThe economic imperatives that drive urbanization also play alarge role in determining the status of the urban environmentand ecosystems, as well as the extent and depth ofpoverty, wealth and inequality in the city. This sub-sectionreviews the ways in which urbanization processes generaterisk by shaping the environment of the city and the growthof slums. The role of global environmental change on disasterrisk in cities is also considered.■ Modifying the hazard environmentConsumption of natural assets (trees for fuel, groundwater,sand and gravel) and the overexploitation of natural services(water systems and air as sinks for sewerage or industrialwaste) modify the environment and generate new hazards.These include deforestation and slope instability within andsurrounding cities, encouraging landslides and flash flooding.Such changes to the urban environment do not impactupon citizens equally.Recent evidence illustrates that with increasing affluenceand through the use of technology, those who producewaste and risk can avoid the consequences both in time andspace. Thus, the environmental costs of over-consumptionby the wealthy become burdens for the poor, who are forcedto live not only in unsafe and insecure housing, but also withurban pollution and environmental degradation. 62 Climatechange is the most extreme example of this thesis. Highconsumption by the rich and in aggregate by richer cities hascontributed 80 per cent of carbon emissions that causeclimate change. Yet, it is the less wealthy and the poor incities, towns and villages who will least be able to cope withand adapt to the local impacts of climate change, eitherdirectly or collectively through government or socialactions. 63Flooding, perhaps more than any other hazard type,has been exacerbated by the physical processes of urbanization.Flood risk has been made worse in urban areas throughthe silting of natural water courses and the lowering of watertables, followed by salt intrusion or land subsidence.Building roads and houses makes it harder for rainwater todrain through the soil, leading to more frequent flash floodingin cities. The loss of mangrove ecosystems on urbanfringes leads to coastal erosion and exposure to storm windand waves. Similarly, deforestation on hill slopes within andsurrounding settled land can create instability and lead togreater landslide hazard. Many losses to Hurricane Mitch,during 1998, in Central America were in small regionaltowns smothered by mudslides or flash floods caused bydeforestation in adjacent agricultural areas. 64 Increasedlosses to flooding can also be expected as the number andsize of urban settlements in coastal areas increases. 65The urban landscape itself is changing the context ofnatural and human-made disasters. Inadequately built multistoreyconstruction has been a cause of losses in many urbandisasters, and skyscrapers have also been the site for devas-Inadequately builtmulti-storeyconstruction hasbeen a cause oflosses in manyurban disasters…