The main contribution of geographical information systems to disaster management is that the integrated system can help conduct accurate (spatial) decision making particularly for areas where they are critical. With the ability of simulating different natural disaster scenarios, ArcGIS application may also enable researchers to create evacuation routes, particularly for areas with higher level of medical and social vulnerabilities. For the first stage of this research, we would like to argue that the current set of integrated social vulnerability measures are not well -tuned enough to take into account other factors such as more complex health -related factors which increase overall population vulnerability. Therefore, the objective of this research is to investigate the connection between the medical and social vulnerability indices in Victoria, Australia.

Chapter Contents:

• 24.1 Introduction
• 24.2 Geographical information system (GIS)
• 24.2.1 Definition of GIS
• 24.2.2 ArcGIS as a system for emergency/disaster management
• 24.2.2.1 Desktop GIS
• 24.2.2.2 Web GIS
• 24.2.2.3 Mobile GIS
• 24.2.2.4 Online GIS and data
• 24.2.2.5 GIS server
• 24.2.3 GIS limitations and constraints
• 24.3 Two types of vulnerability
• 24.3.1 Vulnerability based on socio-economic variables
• 24.3.2 Vulnerability based on medical variables
• 24.4 Methodology
• 24.4.1 Metric construction and preliminary mapping
• 24.4.2 Correlation, reliability and regression analysis
• 24.4.3 Bivariate and residual mapping analysis
• 24.5 Results
• 24.5.1 Social vulnerability index (SoVI)
• 24.5.2 Medical vulnerability index (MedVI)
• 24.5.3 Correlation, reliability and regression analyses
• 24.5.4 Bivariate and residual mapping analysis
• 24.6 Discussion
• 24.7 Conclusion
• References

Inspec keywords: emergency management; geographic information systems

Other keywords: Australia; evacuation routes; population vulnerability; Victoria; medical vulnerabilities; geographical information systems; emergency management; ArcGIS application; social vulnerabilities; vulnerability assessment

Subjects: Geography and cartography computing; Emergency management