Jing Ran

As one of the key vehicles to integrating culture and tourism in urban and rural development, cultural tourism-oriented characteristic towns are increasingly facing natural and social disaster risks caused by global climate variability, large-scale expansion of town areas, and intensified human engineering activities. In particular, characteristic towns that have rapidly developed through tourism based on historical and cultural heritage face challenges such as compact layouts of ancient architectural complexes, extensive outward expansion of newly developed areas, and inadequately planned emergency evacuation systems—making them ill-equipped to cope with increasingly uncertain disaster risks. In response to these issues, this study takes Zhangguying Town in Yueyang County, Hunan Province, as a case study. Through field investigations, interviews, and GIS-based hydrological simulations, the research systematically identifies the characteristics and influencing factors of disaster risks in the town. It also reveals the core dilemmas confronting current disaster prevention planning and proposes strategies such as enhancing chain disaster prevention measures, promoting micro-scale, site-specific disaster prevention retrofitting, and establishing a multi-scale disaster prevention system through “point-line” linkages. By reducing disaster risks, preserving cultural heritage, and optimizing emergency response capacities, this research effectively supports the sustainable development of cultural tourism-oriented characteristic towns from a disaster prevention perspective, enabling these towns to withstand natural hazards while sustaining their historical, cultural, and socio-economic functions. The findings provide a theoretical basis and methodological reference for comprehensive disaster prevention planning in similar cultural tourism-oriented characteristic towns.

Emergency evacuation signage in metro stations plays a critical role in guiding occupants to evacuate quickly and safely. However, variations in placement height and other display attributes can affect the perceptual efficiency of signage. This study takes a metro station in Changsha, China, as an example and constructs two virtual disaster scenarios—fire and flood. An eye-tracking experiment was designed and conducted, yielding 164 valid experimental samples (89 fire, 75 flood). We compared the visual effectiveness of signage at three heights: low (0–0.8 m), medium (0.8–2 m), and high (>2 m). The results indicate that (1) low-position signage exhibits superior immediacy and should be prioritized for emergency response; (2) medium-position signage strikes a balance between perceived importance and immediacy, serving effectively as central nodes for both routine and emergency purposes; (3) high-position signage presents significant advantages in perceived importance and is suitable for conveying comprehensive, multi-level evacuation information. This research provides empirical evidence for optimizing the spatial layout of emergency evacuation signage in metro stations, offering valuable guidance for enhancing emergency evacuation capabilities in subway environments.

Accessible geospatial data are crucial for informed decision making and policy development in urban planning, environmental governance, and hazard mitigation. Spatial data infrastructures (SDIs) have been implemented to facilitate such data access. However, with the rapid advancements in geospatial software and modelling tools, it is important to re-visit the theoretical discussion about the different roles of data-focused SDIs and decision support and modelling tools, particularly in relation to their different impacts on policy making and policy integration. This research focuses on addressing this issue within the specific context of policy integration in spatial planning and flood risk management. To investigate this, an experiment was conducted comparing a data-focused SDI, the Myplan Viewer, with a prototype Internet-based Spatially Integrated Policy Infrastructure (SIPI). The findings reveal that the SIPI, which provides access to both data and decision support and modelling tools, significantly enhances policy integration compared to the Myplan Viewer. Moreover, drawing upon communicative action theory, this study underscores that while data-focused SDIs support instrumental goals, they possess limitations in facilitating trade-offs and balancing diverse interests in the policy-making process, particularly in supporting strategic and communicative actions.

This study provides a comparative analysis of the journey toward hazard-resilience by examining the resilience-related policies and local practices in five exemplary cities worldwide: Cape Town (South Africa), Greater Manchester (UK), Changsha and Wenchuan (China), and San Juan City (Puerto Rico). Through a conceptual framework encompassing seven interrelated dimensions of the social-environmental system, this paper delves into how hazard risk is perceived and resilience is approached in both policy documents and local practices. Policy reviews reveal distinct strategies among cities. Cape Town employs diverse water-saving measures, addressing drought through water resilience. Greater Manchester focuses on human and organizational aspects in disaster risk reduction. Changsha and Wenchuan prioritize specific disaster response measures, while San Juan tackles environmental and socio-economic challenges through multidimensional actions. Local practices illustrate the effectiveness of bottom-up resilience enhancement, with examples including home drilling in Cape Town and community engagement in Changsha. Despite these efforts, there is a common trend across cities of limited consideration for cultural/worldviews and urban-rural-spatial dimensions. Bridging this gap is crucial for effective risk management and disaster recovery. This study underscores the importance of aligning policy formulation with local practices, prioritizing targeted recovery plans, and expanding considerations to include the urban-rural-spatial dimension. Overall, this research contributes valuable insights to the development of hazard-resilient cities, offering policymakers and planners a foundation to prepare cities for future challenges and foster urban resilience.

The policy integration of spatial planning and flood risk management is a promising approach to mitigate flooding. Scholars indicate that the absence of appropriate information base and technological capacity is among the factors impeding this integration. This study found that what needs to be improved is the access to geographic information and geographic technologies by individual policy makers, rather than the ownership of such resources by one organisation as a whole. Based on this finding, we designed the goals and functions for a Spatially Integrated Policy Infrastructure (SIPI) which shares not only geographic information but also models and analysis tools. A prototype of SIPI was also developed as an illustration of the selected functions of this SIPI. The design of SIPI is consistent with other frontier studies and projects in the field of GIS and planning. The development process also provides experience for future studies and development of infrastructures that aim at supporting policy integration.

The policy integration of spatial planning and flood risk management is a promising approach to mitigate flooding. Scholars indicate that the absence of appropriate information base and technological capacity is among the factors impeding this integration. This study found that what needs to be improved is the access to geographic information and geographic technologies by individual policy makers, rather than the ownership of such resources by one organisation as a whole. Based on this finding, we designed the goals and functions for a Spatially Integrated Policy Infrastructure (SIPI) which shares not only geographic information but also models and analysis tools. A prototype of SIPI was also developed as an illustration of the selected functions of this SIPI. The design of SIPI is consistent with other frontier studies and projects in the field of GIS and planning. The development process also provides experience for future studies and development of infrastructures that aim at supporting policy integration.