The heavy rain in China early this month caused great damage to Wuhan, a city of about 10 million people in Hubei Province, leaving almost 200 dead and more than 1.5 million homeless.
Wuhan Stadium looked like a huge bathtub. Crops that were ready to be harvested were flattened and more than 6,000 pigs that could not be moved floated in the water that engulfed their farm. The flooding of Wuhan is having political repercussions in connection with the prevention of corruption in China’s water conservation projects.
Many major Asian cities, such as Taipei, Tokyo, Shanghai, Manila, Dhaka and Mumbai, are facing the same problem — a high risk of flooding and poor preparation. The UN predicts that by 2025 the majority of flood disasters will take place in Asia. This is why initial flood disaster relief efforts in the region must be followed by reviews and discussions of how to prevent floods and mitigate damage.
On Friday last week, Typhoon Nepartak barreled through Taitung. Its strong winds tore down shop signs and billboards, toppled trees, lifted rooftops, damaged cars, destroyed agricultural crops and caused power outages.
The heavy rain brought by the typhoon caused severe destruction and damage, and it is time for an urgent review and discussion about urban flood prevention and water drainage facilities, regulations governing business signs, prevention measures at important facilities and disaster insurance.
Over the past decade, Taiwan has made marked improvements in its flood prevention and drainage facilities, but there are still shortcomings when it comes to typhoon-related flood insurance and flood prevention.
An extremely low proportion of all property — about 1 percent — is covered by typhoon flooding insurance.
Compared with the US and European countries, where flood insurance ratios are high, the mechanisms for transferring disaster risk in Taiwan must be improved. The US National Flood Insurance Program estimates the potential risk of flooding in different areas. It also produces a Flood Insurance Rate Map, which indicates the disaster risk for local communities, and this map forms the basis for property owners or leaseholders when they want to buy flood insurance.
Disaster risk assessment capabilities in Taiwan must be improved so that disaster risk indices for local communities can be calculated. Based on this information, financial mechanisms for dealing with disaster risk must then be established, so that a victim’s losses can be shared following a disaster.
In addition, the onslaught of Nepartak and the strong winds it brought also highlighted the problems caused by the large acrylic shop signs that can be seen across the nation. In this era of digitization and smartphones, these signs on shops along city streets do not really fulfill any purpose.
Living in Philadelphia, I noticed that companies, department stores, museums, fast-food outlets, shops and so on only have small business logos inside the building, and it is very difficult to find signs that stand out from a building. In addition to making it easier to admire the overall aesthetics of an urban landscape, there is also no need to worry about the threat to life from falling shop signs during a storm.
This is why Taiwan in the wake of Nepartak once again should review the issue of shop signs in commercial areas and ensure that all buildings reflect the style and character of their communities.
Su Yu-shou holds a doctorate in city and regional planning from the University of Pennsylvania.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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