Evaluation of the Level of Urban Social Resilience to Earthquakes Using a Good Urban Governance Approach (Case Study of Zanjan City)

Abstract

Resilience is one of the most important factors to achieve sustainable management and good urban governance and it is a way towards the improvement of communities building upon their capacities. Therefore, in present research social resilience of Zanjan city to earthquakes was evaluated using a descriptive-analytical method. The present study employed a database (Geographical Information System (GIS), an analytical-spatial model (social resilience evaluation model) and a decision-making model (Quantified Strategic Planning Matrix (QSPM)). Factors that contribute to the level of social resilience studied in the present research consisted of four criteria and twenty-eight sub-criteria. They were weighted based on their importance using an analytic hierarchical process (AHP); then GIS was used to address the level of social resilience of Zanjan city to earthquakes and finally vulnerable areas and neighborhoods were identified. Findings suggest that about 40% of Zanjan city area is of a low resilience to earthquakes and the most vulnerable areas include the old texture of such neighborhoods as Islam Abad and Kooye Farhang in District 3, Bisim in District 5 and such neighborhoods as Sabzeh Meidan and Davoud Qoli road located in Districts 1 and 2. In the next step, QSPM was used for decision making and selection of optimal strategies in order to prioritize strategies to implement in areas with high vulnerability and low social resilience.