Evaluating urban risks in Europe using publicly available continental-scale data

Cities are major drivers of climate change and are especially at risk from projected changes, such as more frequent and enhanced flood and heatwave events. Many of these hazards are elevated for cities because of their topographic settings (e.g., low-elevation and close to coasts) and urban layout (e.g., impervious fraction), the details of which are unique to each city. While there have been studies of the impact of climate change on cities, these have generally examined exposure in individual cities to projected changes or of urbanized landscapes to one change, such as sea-level rise. This research uses the Local Climate Zone (LCZ) map of Europe as a framework to examine city-based mitigation and adaptation options at a continental scale. The LCZ scheme describes types of urban landscapes and their physical properties that can be used to assess degrees of hazard exposure. These data will be combined with other publicly available geographic datasets on projected climate changes, topography, population, greenhouse gas emissions, etc., to provide a large-scale evaluation of urban risk and responses.