Investigating urban vulnerability against earthquakes using GIS and BWM model (Case study: a part of the Tabriz city)

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Tabriz University

2 University of Tabriz

Abstract

Earthquake is one of the natural hazards that, due to its unexpected nature, often causes a lot of human and financial losses. Currently, there is no way to prevent earthquakes; But with strategies such as identifying vulnerable areas, the resulting damages can be reduced to some extent. In this research, the level of vulnerability of a part of the 2nd zone of Tabriz city against this event has been investigated. For this purpose, first, effective indices (criteria) such as building materials, quality of buildings, age of buildings and number of floors, were specified and related information was collected. Then the weights of these criteria were calculated using the best-worst method (BWM), which is one of the new methods of multi-criteria decision making. In this research, the simplex linear programming method was used to solve the mentioned model, and the inconsistency rate was about 0.06. In each factor map, the best and worst areas were determined by spatial analysis and through calculations based on the condition of the parcels inside each area, instead of the expert opinions (unlike the usual BWM). Finally vulnerability map was produced in GIS environment. Also, the allowable change for the weight of each criterion was specified. The weight of building quality and distance from open spaces have the most and least flexibility against change, respectively. According to the results of the research, area No. 2 is the most vulnerable to earthquakes, which accounts for 16% of the studied area and includes 1815 parcels.

Keywords

Iranian Journal of Remote Sensing and GIS

Articles in Press, Accepted Manuscript
Available Online from 06 February 2024

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