Assessment of vulnerability of six coastal districts in Shanghai to natural disasters

Coastal cities possess an important position in the development of the world, but they have to face high risk in front of natural disasters because of this kind of special location and high-density population and fortune. Coastal cities will suffer much more when confronted hazards of the same intensity. From the angle of hazard-affected bodies in a disaster system, this paper analyzes the socioeconomic and factitious causes of the vulnerability in natural disasters from five points of view. According to the trend of quantification, we attempt to select representative indices to establish vulnerability assessment index systems in natural disasters by some principles. After calculating the index weights with AHP method, this paper sets up a vulnerability assessment model of multiple natural disasters for coastal cities. Finally, after collecting and normalizing the data, this paper computes the regional vulnerability and the human vulnerability of six coastal districts in Shanghai. The results give a reference to disaster management. In the meantime, this paper summarizes the vulnerability characters of natural disasters about coastal cities and put forward some suggestions in order to reduce the vulnerability and mitigate the influence of natural disasters.