Towards Resilient Cities: Optimizing Shelter Site Selection and Disaster Prevention Life Circle Construction Using GIS and Supply-Demand Considerations

City health examinations are integral to China’s urban planning, construction, and management. They effectively identify potential risks and vulnerabilities in urban development, ensuring safety resilience—a critical component. This resilience enhances the city’s ability to withstand internal and external shocks, promoting the safety of urban residents and fostering sustainable city development. Drawing on the Japanese disaster prevention strategy, the disaster prevention life circle emerges as a rescue and protection system during urban disasters, fortifying urban safety resilience. However, smaller and mid-sized cities, constrained by limited resources, significantly need to catch up in disaster prevention planning. Consequently, bolstering safety resilience in these cities becomes a pressing concern. This study focuses on Lindian County in Heilongjiang Province as the urban area under consideration for resilient city objectives. Leveraging the ArcGIS network analysis tool, we optimize the placement of emergency shelters, aligning with urban disaster assessments and the equilibrium of disaster prevention facility supply and demand. Accessibility analysis of emergency shelters was conducted using the Gaussian two-step floating catchment area method. Ultimately, we integrate the range of demand points assigned to each shelter, along with the effective land area reflecting the supply of shelters, as weights into a weighted Voronoi diagram. This diagram is combined with a reference to the entire region to delineate the disaster prevention life circle. Findings reveal that, under the premise of minimizing government construction costs while maximizing coverage and evacuation utilization rates, the optimal resident emergency congregate shelters in the study area are 8, with 98 emergency evacuation and embarkation shelters. Striking a balance between disaster prevention facility supply and demand and regional accessibility, the urban area of Lindian County is segmented into 3 resident disaster prevention life circles and 24 emergency disaster prevention life circles. The objective of this study is to optimize shelter siting and establish disaster prevention life circles in diverse urban areas. This endeavor aims to bolster urban resilience and foster sustainable urban development.