Recent land subsidence caused by the rapid urban development in the Hanoi urban region (Vietnam) using ALOS InSAR data

Since the 1990s the land subsidence due to the rapid urbanization has been considered a severely destructive hazard in the center of Hanoi City. Although previous studies and measurements have quantified the subsiding deformation in Hanoi center, no data exist for the newly established districts in the south and the west, where construction development has been most significant and where groundwater pumping has been very intensive over the last decade. With a multi-temporal InSAR approach, we quantify the spatial distribution of the land subsidence in the whole Hanoi urban region using ALOS images over the 2007–2011 period. The map of the mean subsidence velocity reveals that the northern bank of the Red River appears stable, whereas some areas in southern bank are subsiding with a mean vertical rate up to 68 mm yr−1, especially within the three new urban districts of Hoang Mai, Ha Dong and Hoai Duc. We interpret the spatial distribution of the surface deformation as the combination of the nature of the unsaturated layer, the lowering of groundwater in the aquifers due to pumping withdrawal capacity, the increase of built-up surfaces and the type of building foundation. The time evolution deduced from the InSAR time series is consistent with previous leveling data and shows that the lowering rate of the surface slightly decreases till 2008. Then, a seasonal variation suggests that the deformation became non-stationary, with upward and downward transient displacements related to the charge and discharge of the aquifer following the changes between rainy and dry seasons.