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The study aims to analyze the roles of poverty and African American status in terms of vulnerability to tornado damages and barriers to recovery afterward.

Using five decades of county-level data on tornadoes, the authors test whether economic damages from tornadoes are correlated with vulnerability (proxied by poverty and African American status) and wealth (proxied by median income and educational attainment), controlling for tornado risk. A multinomial logistic difference-in-difference (DID) estimator is used to analyze long-run effects of tornadoes in terms of displacement (reduced proportions of the poor and African Americans), abandonment (increased proportions of those groups) and neither or both.

Controlling for tornado risk, poverty and African American status are linked to greater tornado damages, as is wealth. Absent tornadoes, displacement and abandonment are both more likely to occur in urban settings and communities with high levels of vulnerability, while abandonment is more likely to occur in wealthy communities, consistent with on-going forces of segregation. Tornado damages significantly increase abandonment in vulnerable communities, thereby increasing the prevalence of poor African Americans in those communities. Therefore, the authors conclude that tornadoes contribute to on-going processes generating inequality by poverty/race.

The current paper is the first study connecting tornado damages to race and poverty. It is also the first study finding that tornadoes contribute to long-term processes of segregation and inequality.

This paper analyzes two external costs often associated with port development, cost to fisheries from marine dredge disposal and damages from air pollution, using estimates of development and operation for a proposed (but since cancelled) container port as a case study. For dredge disposal, a bio-economic model was used to assess short- and long-term and indirect (joodweb) damages to fisheries from marine disposal of clean sediments. In the case of air pollution, estimates of annual activity levels and emission coefficients are used to estimate incremental annual emissions of three key pollutants (NOx, HC and CO) for trucks, trains, yard vehicles, and vessels. These estimates allow for phasing in of strict new air pollution regulations. For both external costs, sensitivity analyses are used to reflect uncertainty. Estimates of shadow values in year 2002 dollars amount from $0.094 per cubic yard to $0.169 per cubic yard of clean dredged material for the selected disposal site and from $0.0584 per mile (jor current control standards) to $ 0. 0023 per mile (after phasing in of new regulations) for air pollution from heavy trucks.

Damage functions constitute an essential part of the modelling of critical infrastructure (CI) performance under the influence of climate events. This paper aims to compile and discuss publications comprising damage functions for transport assets.

The research included the collection of contemplable literature and the subsequent screening for damage functions and information on them. In conclusion, the derived damage curves and formulae were transferred to a unified design.

Damage functions for the transport sector are scarce in the literature. Although specific damage functions for particular transport assets exist, they mainly consider infrastructure or transport in general. Occasionally, damage curves for the same asset in different publications vary. Major research gaps persist in wildfire damage estimation.

The study scope was restricted to the hazards of fluvial floods and wildfires. Despite all efforts, this study did not cover all existing literature on the topic.

This publication summarises the state of the art of research concerning transport asset damage functions, and hence contributes to the facilitation of prospective research on CI performance, resilience and vulnerability modelling.

Quality deterioration in bananas along the supply chain (SC) due to cosmetic damage has been a persistent challenge in Australia. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the incidence of cosmetic defects in bananas across the post-harvest SC and determining the causes of the diminished fruit quality at the retail stores.

The study quantified the level of cosmetic damage in 243 cartons of Cavendish bananas across three post-harvest SCs in Australia from pack houses to retail stores and identified the risk factors for cosmetic defects.

The level of cosmetic damage progressively increased from pack house (1.3 per cent) to distribution centre (DC) (9.0 per cent) and retail (13.3 per cent) and was significantly influenced by package height and pallet positioning during transit. Abrasion damage in ripened bananas was influenced by the travel distance between DC and retail store. The study also revealed a range of risk factors contributing to the observed damage including weakened paperboard cartons due to high moisture absorption during the ripening process.

This study only investigated damage incidence in three post-harvest banana SCs in Australia and the damage assessments were confined to packaged bananas.

This study assessed the quality of bananas along the entire post-harvest SC from farm gate to retail store. The study provided knowledge of the extent of the quality defects, when and where the damage occurred and demonstrated the underlying factors for damage along the SC. This will enable the development of practical interventions to improve the quality and minimize wastage of bananas in the retail markets.

This study aims to combine information about sea level rise (SLR), the probability distribution of storm surge, a flood damage function and the value of property by elevation along the coast of selected cities to measure expected flood damage. The selected six cities all have nearby long-term tidal stations that can be used to estimate the probability distribution of floods. The model is calibrated to each city. The study then compares the cost of building higher seawalls today along the coast versus the benefit of each wall (the reduction in expected flood damage).

The combination of coastal storms and SLR has led to extensive flood damage across American cities. This study creates a simple generic model that evaluates whether seawalls would be effective at addressing this flooding problem. The paper develops an approach that readily measures the expected flood benefits and costs of alternative coastal seawalls. The approach takes account of near term SLR and the probability distribution of storm surge. The model finds seawalls are effective only in cities where many buildings are in the 25-year flood plain.

Cities with many buildings built on land below 2 m in elevation (the 25-year flood plain) have high expected flood damage from storms and SLR. Cities which already have many buildings in this flood plain would benefit from seawalls. Assuming seawalls are built above the high tide line, the optimal wall height that maximizes net benefits is between 0.9 to 1.2 m. These relatively low seawalls block 70%–83% of expected flood damage in these cities. Fair flood insurance is the least cost strategy for handling the remaining damages that overtop the optimal seawalls.

The analysis evaluates whether or not to build a seawall the length of each city at high tide lines. However, the analysis also finds several long stretches of coast in two cities where a wall is not warranted because there are few vulnerable buildings. Future analyses should consider seawalls in more spatially detailed sections of each city. Each section could then be analyzed independently. Whether or not more complex hydrodynamic models are needed to evaluate coastal resilience planning should also be explored. Alternative solutions such as planned retreat and nature-based solutions should be compared with seawalls in future studies as well.

Cities should be careful to avoid development in the 25-year flood plain because of high expected flood damage. Cities that have low elevation areas subject to frequent flooding should consider seawalls to reduce frequent flooding. Because they are very costly and have low expected benefits, high walls that can stop a one-hundred-year storm are generally not worth building.

The analysis reveals that the most important factor determining the vulnerability of cities along the eastern coastline of the USA is the number of buildings built below 2 m in elevation (the 25-year flood plain). Cities should use zoning to discourage further development in the 25-year flood plain. Cities which already have many buildings in this flood plain would benefit from city-wide seawalls. Assuming these walls are built at mean high-high tide, the optimal height of current seawalls should be relatively modest – averaging about 0.9–1.2 m above ground. Using fair insurance for the remaining risk is less expensive than building taller walls. In particular, the cost of seawalls that protect against a major hurricane surge are over three times the expected benefit and should not be built. As decades pass and observed sea level progresses, seawalls and the boundary of the 25-year flood plain should be reevaluated.

This paper develops a coastal flood model that combines SLR and the probability distribution of storm surges with the value of property by elevation to estimate the expected damage from storm surge. The model is relatively easy to calibrate making it a practical tool to guide city flood planning. The authors illustrate what insights such a model gives about coastal resilience to flooding across six cities along the Eastern US coastline.