Page 9 - Identifying cascading effects on vital objects during flooding

2. The smart project(s)

2.1. Vision and content

"Identifying cascading effects on vital objects during flooding" is conducted using cases within
the Dutch cities (Utrecht, Amsterdam, Almere, Duiven and Rotterdam) in collaboration with the
Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs. The leading Dutch institutes for applied research Deltares, TNO,
Wageningen UR and ECN combined forces in the 2015 project Adaptive Circular Cities.

The project investigated and experimented with methods for interdisciplinary research and
development to tackle multifactorial challenges.

Looking into the content of this case study, "Identifying cascading effects on vital objects during
flooding" addresses what happens if a dike breaches in Rotterdam.

Figure 2a: Visualization of Impact in Rotterdam in the first 4 and 13 hours 4

As seen in Figure 2a, it models and identifies the direct and indirect impact of flooding in the
city.The aforementioned 3Di tool allows visualization of these impacts over time; i.e. it displays
how the flooding progresses over time in the city and how different city infrastructures will be
affected if they are within the range of impacts. The image on the left side of Figure 2a shows the
impacts in the first 4 hours, whereas the image on the right side shows the impact in 13 hours.
As expected, the impact range (shown by the shaded orange area) has significantly increased in
9 hours. We can see as indirect and cascading impact of the flood effects, as the metro network
and the railway network that cannot be used due to embankment instability. The C2000
emergency communications network is also affected. Additionally, power outage (largely outside
the flooded areas) is expected to take place and will have direct impacts on hospitals and other
public establishments (needs to be evacuated).

Identifying the cascading effects on vital objects during flooding | October 2019 3