Flood Resilience of Private Properties – 28 January 2020
This webinar, focusing on Flood Resilience of Private Properties was based on a Special Issue of Water International (44-5). It was broadcasted live from Utrecht University, in the Netherlands, and featured a panel organized around the FloodLabel project.
The panel brought together a number of different disciplines to consider the ways that private property owners and the government address the issues around flood prevention and management. These presentations first focused on how to fit the flood risk advice for different property owners and the significant impact on their behaviors and perceptions. Our panel then discussed, tailored communications over flood risk that could be tailored to individual property owners rather than treated as a one-size fits all approach. Just as property owners may have different understandings about their risk, they also required that communication with them over these risks fit their mental models and the differing risks that their property faced. Other speakers considered how the Austrian legal system could be accessed and used by private property owners for flood protection. However, these laws face some challenges as they are split into a number of different areas and there is a lack of unity. Our final presenter considered the differences between the legal frameworks around the United States, European Union, and England, as well as the impacts these frameworks have when assigning risk and providing insurance coverage and the responds of private property owners including their preparedness.
With almost 90 attendees registered, the Flood Resilience of Private Properties webinar was very popular. IWRA thanks again its panellists for their participation and engagement that counted with: Thomas Hartmann, Wageningen University; Peter Davids, Gent University; Karin Snel, Utrecht University; Magdalena Rauter, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences of Vienna; and, Sally Priest, Middlesex University. This event was moderated by Scott McKenzie, IWRA Webinars Officer.
Presentations can now be accessed by clicking on the titles below:
- More than a one-size-fits-all approach: Tailoring flood risk communication to plural residents’ perspectives
- Deconstructing the legal framework for flood protection in Austria: Individual and state responsibilitiesfrom a planning perspective
- The effects of tailor-made flood risk advice for homeowners in Flanders, Belgium
- Sticks and carrots for reducing property-level risks from floods: an EU–US comparative perspective
Acknowledgement
This webinar results from the project on “Preparing urban private property for floods: resilience and recovery in built up areas” of the “FUTURE DELTAS” programme of Utrecht University, with Thomas Hartmann, Willemijn Doorn-Hoekveld, Marleen van Rijswick and Tejo Spit as main investigators. It is also linked to the EU COST Action LAND4FLOOD on Natural Flood Retention on Private Land (CA16209, www.land4flood.eu). The webinar was embedded in the final conference of the JPI Urban Europe project FLOODLABEL (www.floodlabel.eu).
