Risk Prevention and Spatial Planning—the Example of the District of Cologne

Abstract

With the demonstration project “Preventive Risk Management and Regional Planning” the exemplary development, implementation and documentation of an integrated concept for risk prevention embedded within regional planning was elaborated. The project was based on the concept of risk governance. It was implemented in the case study region of the District of Cologne, which was represented by its departments for regional development, immission control and water management. Within a broader scope of analysis, special attention was paid to critical infrastructures.

For regional planning those risks and hazards are most important that require a cross-sectoral, regional response (see Art. 1 § 1 and Art. 8 § 6 Federal Regional Planning Act), as their impacts or related response strategies are of regional character. Therefore, the following four hazards were selected: river flooding, earthquakes, major accident hazards and heat.

For these four potential dangers hazard and susceptibility classes were defined in accordance with a concept of risk analysis developed by the Federal Office for Civil Protection and Crisis Prevention. Hazard and susceptibility were merged into an integrated risk index. The categorization into hazard classes was the result of a consensus-building process among the project team and the participating experts of the District of Cologne. Furthermore, the team collaboratively defined specific susceptibilities for each land-use function (e. g. residential areas, transport infrastructure etc.) regarding each of the four selected types of hazards.

On this conceptual basis, a GIS-based analysis of the risks that are caused by the selected hazards was conducted. Main results are hazard, susceptibility and risk maps for river floods, earthquakes and major accident hazards—both for the entire region and (with a finer resolution) for selected hot spots. Moreover, the project developed recommendations for regulations on risk management as a basis for the necessary weighting up of risk prevention against other planning concerns. Finally, a roadmap for spatial risk management as an integrated part of a comprehensive regional plan was derived.

The District of Cologne will use the project’s results as an evidence basis for the forthcoming update of the regional plan. This is of particular importance in view of the recent amendment of the EU Environmental Impact Assessment Directive (2014/52/EU) that widened the scope of this assessment to climate change and catastrophic risks.