Construction of a Composite Vulnerability Index to Map Peripheralization Risk in Urban and Metropolitan Areas

Roberto Gerundo, Alessandra Marra and Viviana De Salvatore
Additional contact information
Roberto Gerundo: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Salerno, Via Giovanni Paolo II, 132-84084 Fisciano (SA), Italy
Alessandra Marra: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Salerno, Via Giovanni Paolo II, 132-84084 Fisciano (SA), Italy
Viviana De Salvatore: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Salerno, Via Giovanni Paolo II, 132-84084 Fisciano (SA), Italy

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 11, 1-26

Abstract: As cities and poverty continue to grow worldwide, both spatial and a-spatial peripheralization processes expose entire urban and metropolitan areas at risk of degradation, not just traditional peripheries. The main aim of this paper is to propose a methodology for peripheralization risk assessment, according to the general theory of territorial risk, in order to identify priority areas where mitigation actions should be envisaged through urban and territorial planning. Such an approach constitutes the novelty of the work. So, peripheralization risk is defined for the first time, depending on aggregated vulnerability and exposure. Based on a literature review, a set of vulnerability indicators structured in three dimensions is defined in order to construct the composite vulnerability index in the Italian geographical context. Due to the absence of well-established threshold values, an aggregation method based on fuzzy logic is used. The methodology was applied to a conurbation of 16 municipalities in Campania Region (Italy). Obtained results showed that areas most at risk can be both peripheral and central neighborhoods, but also entire municipalities, demonstrating how mitigation actions are needed at different planning levels. Since the necessary input data are ordinarily available in planning processes, the proposed methodology can be transferred to other geographical contexts.

Keywords: risk analysis; urban vulnerability; sustainable development; urban planning; fuzzy logic; geographic information systems (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/11/4641/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/11/4641/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:11:p:4641-:d:368063

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().