Why coastal ports and resilience?

For this project, resilience is defined as the ability to reach an acceptable level of functioning after an event and to “bounce forward” to prepare for the next event

Community Resilience is a Multidimensional Process

Wilbanks 2007; Colten et al. 2008; Cote and Nightingale, 2012; MacKinnon and Derickson, 2013; Weichselgartner and Kelman, 2014

Components of a process to build resilience: - Multiple stakeholders - Local citizen input and

knowledge - Needs of target community - Strategies to promote local

resilience

Participatory Research Process to develop the PRI 1. Assembled an expert committee

2. Distributed an online survey 3. Held a project kick-off meeting 4. Organized a two-day work session 5. Conducted three pilot tests*** 6. Final review by expert committee

7. Final Draft with 87 indicator questions!

Challenges and Opportunities for the PRI

Ports are unique Resource for new leaders and port managers Repeated occurrences provide evidence of trends and progress in resilience planning efforts

Elements the Gulf Coast port industry identifies as important to increase resilience to natural hazards

Groundtruthing the PRI Hazard Assessment: Infrastructure and Assets Does your Port consider historic trends and past events to identify information related to hazard risks in long-term planning (i.e., 20 years) for disasters? to Does your Port consider historic trends and past events (e.g., climatic data, weather records, incidents on-site, economic trends) to identify information related to hazard risks and probabilities for future acute events (e.g., hurricanes, chemical spill)? …for future chronic events (e.g., sea level rise, shoreline erosion, economic recession)?

Participant Feedback on Participatory Process Did you learn anything new today? 55% said yes Some things Port does that I was not aware of...we identified some “holes” in some of our plans...gave me ideas on items we may need to work on... learned about Port’s processes as a newcomer Do you think the Ports Resilience Index is a useful tool to improve resilience? 70% said yes Makes you discuss things you may not normally discuss or think about…gets the discussion started on multiple levels...provides a forum for thinking through and analyzing planning processes

Conclusions from Pilot Tests

Historical experience with natural hazards influences the interpretation of the questions The process of building resilience depends on who is at the table. The discussion process gets people from across the hallway talking to each other.

PRI’s Contribution to Resilience Measurement

“measuring resilience” –it’s difficult to assign a metric to a process that happens with people The participatory approach to assessing resilience is a way to build capacity for resilience.

Thank you!!! Dissertation Research Questions: 1. How does the participatory process used to develop the PRI identify the

factors that ports consider to be important in building resilience to hazards? 2. At a localized and individualized scale, how does the process of engaging

stakeholders in a discussion provide further insight into port resilience compared to the written plans and objectives of hazard-related port documents?

3. How does the PRI process incorporate contextual factors of a port’s identity in discussions of resilience?

4. How might the process of developing the PRI, a qualitative resilience assessment tool, be transferable across spatial and organization scales as a method to understand and build resilience?

Lauren Land Morris (Advisor: Dr. Craig Colten) PhD Candidate at Louisiana State University PRI Project Coordinator lland1@lsu.edu

Port Tampa Bay