Megacities and small towns: different perspectives on hazard vulnerability

Abstract The vulnerability of megacities to hazards was highlighted during the recent International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction, yet in many respects residents of small cities and rural communities are more vulnerable to disasters. Small cities and towns, deprived of the political and economic influence of megacities, lack the potential to suffer catastrophic losses that would seriously impact the global economy. Megacities, however, have greater disaster resilience. Hazard vulnerability of communities, ranging from small towns to megacities, can best be viewed as the summation of a continuum of conditions that define physical and social exposure, disaster resilience, pre-event mitigation or preparedness, and postevent response. Megacities have large populations at risk, but have the greatest resources to deal with hazards and disasters. Small communities have far smaller populations at risk, but often far higher proportions of their populations can be vulnerable. The impacts of many disasters can be experienced over the entirety of smaller communities, but many hazards lack the spatial dimension to affect an entire metropolitan area.