Been reading about Mt Vesuvius. Not a good book, more like a list of all the people who have ever visited the volcano.

I hadn’t realised. Mt Vesuvius is now essentially a suburb of Naples. The outer suburbs of Naples completely and literally circle Mt Vesuvius. No matter which way Vesuvius decides to erupt, thousands of people are going to die. It’s almost an inner suburb because the outer suburb Nocera Inferiore on the far side of Mt Vesuvius is twice as far from Naples City centre as the summit of Mt Vesuvius is. Urban life approaches to only 3 km from the summit, and is no more than 5 km away in every direction. Pompeii (now a suburb) is 10.4 km from the summit. During the eruption that destroyed Pompeii, even Miseno, 30 km away in the opposite direction, had to be evacuated. A 30 km radius around Mt Vesuvius includes ALL of Naples. Although the last major eruptions were in 1906, 1929 and 1944, even I had the opportunity of seeing a small eruption of Vesuvius in Jan 1981 (give or take a month).

Is this the worst example of urban planning in the world?

mollwollfumble said:

Been reading about Mt Vesuvius. Not a good book, more like a list of all the people who have ever visited the volcano.

I hadn’t realised. Mt Vesuvius is now essentially a suburb of Naples. The outer suburbs of Naples completely and literally circle Mt Vesuvius. No matter which way Vesuvius decides to erupt, thousands of people are going to die. It’s almost an inner suburb because the outer suburb Nocera Inferiore on the far side of Mt Vesuvius is twice as far from Naples City centre as the summit of Mt Vesuvius is. Urban life approaches to only 3 km from the summit, and is no more than 5 km away in every direction. Pompeii (now a suburb) is 10.4 km from the summit. During the eruption that destroyed Pompeii, even Miseno, 30 km away in the opposite direction, had to be evacuated. A 30 km radius around Mt Vesuvius includes ALL of Naples. Although the last major eruptions were in 1906, 1929 and 1944, even I had the opportunity of seeing a small eruption of Vesuvius in Jan 1981 (give or take a month).

Is this the worst example of urban planning in the world?

is now, being that they had to move Naples but never bothered moving it far enough.

Obviously people want to live there and don’t mind the risk.

Divine Angel said:

Obviously people want to live there and don’t mind the risk.

“See Naples and die.” It was a phrase coined during the reign of the Bourbons of Naples, considered by historians to have been the city’s Golden Age.

Divine Angel said:

Obviously people want to live there and don’t mind the risk.

Today, it is regarded as one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world because of the population of 3,000,000 people living nearby and its tendency towards explosive (Plinian) eruptions. It is the most densely populated volcanic region in the world.

Most of the major populated areas of the world are located in such dangerous spots.

I just had a look through “UN Habitat for a better urban future” and in particular their “Cities at Risk” “Habitat Debate” 1 Dec 2006. Sixteen cities are specifically considered “at risk” of major disaster (including New York, Rio, Buenos Aires etc.), and Naples is not one of them. Short-sighted gits.

roughbarked said:

Most of the major populated areas of the world are located in such dangerous spots.

Sure. Look at Japan. Probably not a major volcanic threat in the order of Mt Vesuvius, but they’re right on a hotspot for earthquakes and resulting tsuanamis. Almost 16,000 people died.
Ref

mollwollfumble said:

I just had a look through “UN Habitat for a better urban future” and in particular their “Cities at Risk” “Habitat Debate” 1 Dec 2006. Sixteen cities are specifically considered “at risk” of major disaster (including New York, Rio, Buenos Aires etc.), and Naples is not one of them. Short-sighted gits.

The reasons for major centres are principally resource rich sites. ie: major fault intersections at the edges of tectonic plates and Maritime Ports.

Divine Angel said:

roughbarked said:

Most of the major populated areas of the world are located in such dangerous spots.

Sure. Look at Japan. Probably not a major volcanic threat in the order of Mt Vesuvius, but they’re right on a hotspot for earthquakes and resulting tsuanamis. Almost 16,000 people died.
Ref

Can find precious resources in such spots.

mollwollfumble said:

I just had a look through “UN Habitat for a better urban future” and in particular their “Cities at Risk” “Habitat Debate” 1 Dec 2006. Sixteen cities are specifically considered “at risk” of major disaster (including New York, Rio, Buenos Aires etc.), and Naples is not one of them. Short-sighted gits.

Do you have a link for that research?

I was surprised that so few died on Japan in that tsunami. Clearly not as heavily populated as the region around the Aceh Tsunami.

I went there last year. It’s intimidating seeing it close up, and how surrounded it is by built up areas… If it goes again in a big way, the affect will be devastating.

Divine Angel said:

mollwollfumble said:

I just had a look through “UN Habitat for a better urban future” and in particular their “Cities at Risk” “Habitat Debate” 1 Dec 2006. Sixteen cities are specifically considered “at risk” of major disaster (including New York, Rio, Buenos Aires etc.), and Naples is not one of them. Short-sighted gits.

Do you have a link for that research?

http://ww2.unhabitat.org/HD/

Asian Disaster preparedness

• I hadn’t realised. Mt Vesuvius is now essentially a suburb of Naples. The outer suburbs of Naples completely and literally circle Mt Vesuvius. No matter which way Vesuvius decides to erupt, thousands of people are going to die.
  
  
  Humanity don’t always follow a logical path.

> Japan.

I agree.

Divine Angel said:

mollwollfumble said:

I just had a look through “UN Habitat for a better urban future” and in particular their “Cities at Risk” “Habitat Debate” 1 Dec 2006. Sixteen cities are specifically considered “at risk” of major disaster (including New York, Rio, Buenos Aires etc.), and Naples is not one of them. Short-sighted gits.

Do you have a link for that research?

“Habitat Debate” Dec 2006, Vol 12, No 4. “Cities at Risk” p. 7 and “Special Map” pp. 12-13. http://www.alnap.org/resource/7460

Am also reading a book I have at home with a couple of interesting quotes, not from the eruption of Vesuvius but from the eruption of Mt Pelee on Martinique in the Caribbean. I think you’ll find them relevant.

1) From May 5, 1902 “Professor Landes of Lycee concludes that Mt Pelee presents no more danger to the inhabitants of Saint Pierre than does Vesuvius to those of Naples”. The town of Saint Pierre was completely destroyed on May 8.

2) A Neapolitan named Marino Leboff, captaining the Italian bark Orsolina, brushed past port authorities who refused him permission to sail , ‘I know nothing about Mount Pelee’, he said, ignoring their orders, ‘but if Vesuvius were looking the way your volcano looks this morning, I’d get out of Naples.’

A serious problem with Naples is that there is no way out. To travel on the main route from Naples, the Autostrada del Sol, residents of Naples first have to APPROACH the volcano. The Autostrada then roughly parallels the flank of the volcano, at a distance of just 10 km. The Caserta Nola Salerno, a bypass of Naples to the east is no better, also paralleling the flank of Vesuvius at 10 km. The other roads are smaller, and none heads away from the volcano to the west or south because that’s where the ocean is. There’s no way that even a small percentage of the 3 million people could be evacuated by sea. Those in the seaside suburbs between Vesuvius and the coast, for example Torre del Greco, are in deadly peril.

The scars left by the eruption of Mt Pelee in 1902 are still very clearly visible in Google Earth. I am also dismayed to note that a new housing development has been built on the flow of debris from the eruption. I know it’s new because it was still under construction in the historical Google Earth image from 2004.

mollwollfumble said:

A serious problem with Naples is that there is no way out. To travel on the main route from Naples, the Autostrada del Sole, residents of Naples first have to APPROACH the volcano. The Autostrada then roughly parallels the flank of the volcano, at a distance of just 10 km. The Caserta Nola Salerno, a bypass of Naples to the east is no better, also paralleling the flank of Vesuvius at 10 km. The other roads are smaller, and none heads away from the volcano to the west or south because that’s where the ocean is. There’s no way that even a small percentage of the 3 million people could be evacuated by sea. Those in the seaside suburbs between Vesuvius and the coast, for example Torre del Greco, are in deadly peril.

Do I need to mention that the centre of Naples (its industrial area, all its railway lines and the Autostrada del Sole) is a flood plain all less than 10 m above sea level? Just waiting to be hit by a tsunami.

That’s pretty scary.

Pompeii is well worth a visit. amazing site.

Boris said:

Pompeii is well worth a visit. amazing site.

My grandparents went there before departing for Aus from Naples in 1950. Totes jelly of the Pompeii bit, not so much the reffo bit…

a problem of the european holiday is that there is so much cool shit to see where do you start? after 6 months were we cultured out. almost.

mollwollfumble said:

A serious problem with Naples is that there is no way out. To travel on the main route from Naples, the Autostrada del Sol, residents of Naples first have to APPROACH the volcano. The Autostrada then roughly parallels the flank of the volcano, at a distance of just 10 km. The Caserta Nola Salerno, a bypass of Naples to the east is no better, also paralleling the flank of Vesuvius at 10 km. The other roads are smaller, and none heads away from the volcano to the west or south because that’s where the ocean is. There’s no way that even a small percentage of the 3 million people could be evacuated by sea. Those in the seaside suburbs between Vesuvius and the coast, for example Torre del Greco, are in deadly peril.

Now you’d think if the Powers That Be decide to build up the area, they could at least give people a fighting chance to evacuate. It’s akin to not having enough lifeboats for a sinking ship.

One part of my ignorance that really annoys me is that if I (or almost anyone) was to try to predict which city on Earth would lead to the greatest casualties of all time due to an earthquake, my first choice would not have been Tangshan, in China west of Korea. The 1976 Tangshan Earthquake, with an initial reported death toll of 655,000, is the deadliest earthquake on record. “The Tangshan Earthquake of July 28, 1976. No other earthquake in this century has been as catastrophic or has claimed as many lives as the earthquake that struck the city of Tangshan in Northern China on July 28, 1976 (27 July 1976 local date). Tangshan, a thriving industrial city with one million inhabitants, is located in the Province of Hebei, about 95 miles east and slightly south of Beijing and about 280 miles southwest of Haicheng – where in the previous year another very destructive earthquake had occurred. Although the region had experienced moderate seismic activity in the past, there were no foreshocks this time, and no warning.”

But Tangshan is not even on the boundary of a major plate. It’s on the boundary of the “Amurian microplate” which stretches from Tangshan in the south to Lake Baikal in the west to, um, the northern tip of Sakhalin Island in the North East. So far as I can tell, only the southern edge is troubled by earthquakes. It’s even hard to pick up Tangshan on a map of China’s seismic zones. It’s the small east-west oriented blob in the north-east.

On this map look 40 degrees north, 118 degrees east.

Tangshan had 1 million people in 1976. Now it has 3 million people in the built-up metropolitan area, and “has become a tourist attraction”.

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides. If a structure (such as Hong Kong) is to be built in a typhoon or flood zone then an engineer will make certain in advance that it will survive the typhoon or flood virtually undamaged. The same should be true of urban planners.

mollwollfumble said:

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides. If a structure (such as Hong Kong) is to be built in a typhoon or flood zone then an engineer will make certain in advance that it will survive the typhoon or flood virtually undamaged. The same should be true of urban planners.

How manh dodgy town civil engineers have we had in Australia then? So many places are flood prone.

mollwollfumble said:

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

Arts said:

mollwollfumble said:

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

Top class. A big issue with such poweplants is availability of water for cooling.

The Chinese City of Nanjing is the centre of the site of the worst ever natural disaster. The central China floods of 1931 involving the Yangtze and Huai rivers killed somewhere between 2.5 and 3.7 million people. Annoyingly, this isn’t even mentioned in the wikipedia article on Nanjing. Most of Nanjing is less than 10 metres above sea level, despite being 300 km from the ocean. Nanjing has a total population of 8.16 million in 2012-2013, and an urban population of 6.55 million.

Thankfully, the Three Gorges project opened in 2003 will help (a bit) to alleviate the flooding of Nanjing in future.

OMG. Shanghai, downstream of the confluence of the Yangtze and Huai rivers and sited on the river bank, averages only about 5 metres above sea level. Population more than 24 million. In a flood there would be nowhere to go. And it’s in a typhoon region.

Arts said:

mollwollfumble said:

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

Arts said:

mollwollfumble said:

Divine Angel said:

With the ever expanding population, they have to go somewhere. Having major colonisations in places prone to natural disasters can’t be prevented.

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

Quite.

What Mollwoll said is what they should be doing. The fact is in many cases it doesn’t happen that way.

Sometimes there is a good reason for that, such as it is often impossible to build a major highway without crossing an active fault, but in others (such as Naples, and for that matter Wellington, Tokyo and LA) it is too politically difficult, and in others, such as Fukushima and any other nuclear reactor built on an ocean coast, its just a matter of the responsible designers not thinking through what the consequences of the worst case event are, or having thought them through, being unwilling to say that the structure should not be built in that location.

mollwollfumble said:

Arts said:

mollwollfumble said:

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

perhaps those urban planners need to collaborate and listen

mollwollfumble said:

Arts said:

mollwollfumble said:

You’re clearly not a civil engineer. Civil Engineers design buildings, roads, railways, bridges etc. to withstand the worst that nature (or humans) can be expected throw at them over a long period of time. So if an engineer wants to build a dam or a nuclear power plant, he’ll make darn certain that it isn’t anywhere near a dangerous fault line, or anywhere prone to landslides.

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

No, it isn’t.

It was terrible design. They located systems that were essential for dealing with an emergency in positions where they would no longer work under certain emergency conditions, such as the one that occurred. And the tsunami wasn’t even anywhere near the worst credible event.

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.

LOL.

mollwollfumble said:

The 1976 Tangshan Earthquake, with an initial reported death toll of 655,000, is the deadliest earthquake on record.
…
The Chinese City of Nanjing is the centre of the site of the worst ever natural disaster. The central China floods of 1931 involving the Yangtze and Huai rivers killed somewhere between 2.5 and 3.7 million people. Annoyingly, this isn’t even mentioned in the wikipedia article on Nanjing. Most of Nanjing is less than 10 metres above sea level, despite being 300 km from the ocean. Nanjing has a total population of 8.16 million in 2012-2013, and an urban population of 6.55 million.

Thankfully, the Three Gorges project opened in 2003 will help (a bit) to alleviate the flooding of Nanjing in future.

OMG. Shanghai, downstream of the confluence of the Yangtze and Huai rivers and sited on the river bank, averages only about 5 metres above sea level. Population more than 24 million. In a flood there would be nowhere to go. And it’s in a typhoon region.

Beijing isn’t in as nearly a bad state as Shanghai. But at only 50 metres above sea level it’s on the same “North China” flood plain as Nanjing/Shanghai, so has a (small) flooding risk.
and
Beijing is in the same earthquake region as Tangshan.

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

Arts said:

they did a bang up job at Fukushima …

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

No, it isn’t.

It was terrible design. They located systems that were essential for dealing with an emergency in positions where they would no longer work under certain emergency conditions, such as the one that occurred. And the tsunami wasn’t even anywhere near the worst credible event.

not to mention that TEPCO had regularly been caught doing the wrong thing at Fukushima

an operator who used to work there said it was an open secret that the Fukushima plant was a ticking time bomb – when he left he moved as far as he could from the place

mollwollfumble said:

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

Where “ great engineering design” = 3 of the four reactors exploding.

pommiejohn said:

mollwollfumble said:

They did. It was designed to withstand a tsunami. And successfully withstood even a bigger tsunami than the design one without killing anyone.
Death toll from engineering design of Fukushima nuclear plant. 0 people
Death toll from urban design (including fires from ruptured gas pipelines). 18,550 people, including 47,500 buildings totally destroyed.
That really is a perfect example of great engineering design and shithouse urban design.

Where “ great engineering design” = 3 of the four reactors exploding.

Yes !
As opposed to “terrible urban design” which kills 13,000 people.

an ignorant comparison.

Boris said:

an ignorant comparison.

Knowledgeable. I’m the only person on the forum with a PhD in Engineering. There seems to be the mistaken impression on the forum that “good engineering” is synonymous with “never failing”. That is a myth. Everything fails, it’s the job of the engineer to balance failure rate against consequences.

Other cities at extreme risk from natural disasters are those that have already been destroyed by them. For earthquakes this includes many cities in China as well as well known examples of Lisbon, San Francisco, Los Angeles, throughout the Mediterranean, etc.

The countries hardest hit by earthquakes have been, in order from most to least disastrous: China, Indonesia, Turkey, Syria, Japan, India, Haiti, Italy, Turkmenistan, Peru, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, West Bank, Ecuador, Greece, Tunisia, Egypt.

The worst ten flood disasters have been in China, Netherlands and North Vietnam. The whole of eastern China, and the whole of the Netherlands, are particularly vulnerable to flooding. The Chinese floods are the world’s worst natural disasters.

The deadliest cyclones have been in Bangladesh, India, China, Vietnam, Myanmar.

I worry about cities Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Both are very close to sea level just across the gulf from an Earthquake zone.

This map is interesting, it puts Australia (including Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth) at higher earthquake risk than almost all of Africa. Buildings in Australia, being primarily brick, are extremely vulnerable to earthquakes.

For higher resolution see:
https://mitnse.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/globalseismichazardmap.jpg

mollwollfumble said:

Knowledgeable. I’m the only person on the forum with a PhD in Engineering. There seems to be the mistaken impression on the forum that “good engineering” is synonymous with “never failing”. That is a myth. Everything fails, it’s the job of the engineer to balance failure rate against consequences.

No-one has said anything about “never failing”. The reasons why it was a terrible design are precisely covered by what you just said:

1) They did not design for potential earthquake/tsunami to the degree required for the potential consequences of failure.
2) The emergency systems were placed in a vulnerable location when they could have been placed in a protected location at very little extra cost.

Having a PhD has zero correlation (or maybe negative correlation) with an understanding of basic engineering principles.

The Rev Dodgson said:

mollwollfumble said:

Knowledgeable. I’m the only person on the forum with a PhD in Engineering. There seems to be the mistaken impression on the forum that “good engineering” is synonymous with “never failing”. That is a myth. Everything fails, it’s the job of the engineer to balance failure rate against consequences.

No-one has said anything about “never failing”. The reasons why it was a terrible design are precisely covered by what you just said:

1) They did not design for potential earthquake/tsunami to the degree required for the potential consequences of failure.
2) The emergency systems were placed in a vulnerable location when they could have been placed in a protected location at very little extra cost.

Having a PhD has zero correlation (or maybe negative correlation) with an understanding of basic engineering principles.

lulz

Haven’t many disasters that cause catastrophic failure of buildings, power plants, etc been due to cost cutting, complete incompetence in dealing with the initial aftermath of the disaster, human error due to slackness of maintenance and other similar events hindsight later reveals.