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Project Team

Reinhorn head shot

Civil, Structural & Environmental Engineering;
University at Buffalo

Renschler Head Shot
Geography; University at Buffalo

Michel Bruneau
Civil, Structural & Environmental Engineering;
University at Buffalo

Lucy Arendt
Management; University of Wisconsin Green Bay

Gian Paolo Cimellaro
Structural/Geotechnical Engineering; University of Torino, Italy

Graduate Students

Amy Frazier
Geography;
University at Buffalo

Sponsor

Project Duration

9/2009 to 9/2010

A Framework for Defining and Measuring Disaster Resilience at the Community Scale

“A Framework for Defining and Measuring Disaster Resilience at the Community Scale,” funded by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), builds on previous MCEER research linking the four resilience properties (robustness, redundancy, resourcefulness, and rapidity) and resilience dimensions (technical, organizational, societal and economic). The project is developing quantitative and qualitative models to measure the disaster resilience of communities in terms of capital assets such as hospitals and asset classes such as health care facilities. Over the longer term, these models will enable the development of decision-support software tools to help planners, key decision makers and stakeholders enhance the disaster resilience of their communities.

The research effort has three main tasks:

Conduct a literature survey analyzing asset-based approaches for defining and measuring disaster resilience;
Identify gaps between asset-based approaches and community scale approaches and develop a conceptual approach to define and measure disaster resilience at the community scale; and
Publish a technical report that synthesizes findings from the research effort to set the stage for further developments.

Project Team Web Site

The Project Team Web Site is only accessible to members of the project team. To obtain a password, please contact Andrei Reinhorn or Chris Renschler.