SCC-CIVIC-FA Track B: Helping Rural Counties to Enhance Flooding and Coastal Disaster Resilience and Adaptation

洪水是美国自然灾害的主要原因，国会预算办公室估计每年损失540亿美元。虽然城市和农村地区都极易受到洪水危害，但大多数自然灾害复原力研究都侧重于城市地区，往往忽视了农村社区。其中一个被忽视的地区是毗邻五大湖的许多农村社区。由于水位上升，这些社区面临前所未有的挑战，特别是自2012年以来，水位上升导致社区遭受严重的沿海洪灾。洪水灾害评估是一个重要的工具，用于支持社区确定如何减轻洪水;然而，目前的洪水灾害建模工具的数据缺口，使他们不准确的农村社区。该项目汇集了社区合作伙伴，包括一个区域规划机构，县官员和当地官员从基维诺湾印第安社区，与大学团队，以了解在解决洪水和沿海灾害的数据差距在密歇根州北方两个农村县。该项目将使用各种战略，包括传感器和众包信息，以填补关键的信息空白，以改善五大湖周边农村社区的洪水灾害建模。联邦紧急事务管理局（FEMA）和国土安全部（DHS）通常建议各县使用一种名为HAZUS的免费工具，以制定减灾计划并增强社区的复原力和适应能力。然而，对于农村社区，HAZUS中标准数据集的使用往往存在严重缺陷，除非增加额外的数据和分析。拟议项目的愿景是开发使用遥感数据资源和公民参与（众包）的方法，以解决目前的数据差距，改进洪水灾害建模和可视化，并可转移到其他农村社区。该项目的成果将通过利用在地质工程、土木工程、计算机科学、海洋工程、城市规划、河流和洪泛区水力学、社会科学和遥感等领域工作的调查人员的专业知识和背景，扩大自然灾害防备和复原力的传统前沿。该项目是美国国家科学基金会、能源部车辆技术办公室、国土安全部科学技术局和联邦应急管理局合作的“公民创新挑战”项目的一部分。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Flooding is a leading cause of natural disasters in the US, with congressional budget office estimates of $54 billion in loss each year. Although both urban and rural areas are highly vulnerable to flood hazards, most natural disaster resilience studies have focused on urban areas, often overlooking rural communities. One such area that has been overlooked are the many rural communities bordering the Great Lakes. These communities face unprecedented challenges due to rising water levels, particularly since 2012, which have resulted in significant coastal flooding in the communities. Flood hazard assessments are a critical tool used to support communities in determining how to mitigate flooding; however, data gaps in current flood hazard modeling tools render them inaccurate for rural communities. The project brings together community partners—including a regional planning agency, county officials, and local officials from the Keweenaw Bay Indian community—with a university team to understand the data gaps in addressing flooding and coastal disaster in two rural counties in Northern Michigan. The project will use various strategies, including sensors and crowdsourced information, to fill critical information gaps required to improve flood hazard modeling in rural communities bordering the Great Lakes. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) commonly recommend counties to use a freely available tool, called HAZUS, to develop hazard mitigation plans and enhance community resilience and adaptation. However, for rural communities, the use of standard datasets within HAZUS often has serious deficiencies, unless augmented with additional data and analyses. The proposed project's vision is to develop methods that use remote sensing data resources and citizen engagement (crowdsourcing) to address current data gaps for improved flood hazard modeling and visualization that is transferable to other rural communities. The results of the project will expand the traditional frontiers of preparedness and resilience to natural disasters by drawing on the expertise and backgrounds of investigators working at the interface of geological engineering, civil engineering, computer science, marine engineering, urban planning, river and floodplain hydraulics, social science, and remote sensing. This project is part of the Civic Innovation Challenge, a collaboration between NSF, the Department of Energy's Vehicle Technology Office, and the Department of Homeland Security's Science and Technology Directorate and Federal Emergency Management Agency.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.