Modern vs traditional mapping methods for flood risk estimation: A case study for the river Pikrodafni, Athens, Greece

The assessment of human progress often relies on factors such as the availability of energy and resources, the improvement of life expectancy, education, equality, democracy, justice, civilization, and other crucial elements. A significant concern within this evaluation revolves around the inclusivity and accessibility of technological advancements. However, human progress is more than that, since it can also manifest itself in the scientific and technical advances in treating natural hazards presenting a diachronic issue to societies’ resilience. In this study, the progress of engineering in analyzing and managing flood risk between the 1970s and present times is evaluated. To this aim, we utilize the experience of engineers who completed surveying, hydrological, and hydraulic studies for flood risk assessment in the 1970s, to carry out comparisons with recent methodologies applied in the framework of the Programming Agreement between the Prefecture of Attica and the Operational Unit BEYOND Centre of EO Research and Satellite Remote Sensing of the Institute of Astronomy, Astrophysics, Space Applications & Remote Sensing (IAASARS) of the National Observatory of Athens (NOA), in cooperation with the Research Group ITIA of the Department of Water Resources and Environmental Engineering of the School of Civil Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) to the Pikrodafni stream, in Attica, Greece. Specifically, we quantify the progress made and differences between the two periods, in terms of human resources, computational cost, and accuracy of practices and methodologies.