Mass movement susceptibility assessment of alpine infrastructure in the Salzkammergut area, Austria

Bibliographic Data

ID22028262
AuthorsLorena Abad (0000-0003-0554-734X, University of Salzburg, corresponding author), Daniel Hölbling (0000-0001-9282-8072, University of Salzburg), Florian Albrecht (0000-0002-1968-7346, University of Salzburg), Helen Cristina Dias (0000-0002-5006-7006, Universidade de São Paulo), Zahra Dabiri (0000-0003-1015-1657, University of Salzburg), Gerald Reischenböck, Dajana Tešić (0000-0002-3948-3420, University of Novi Sad)
Year2022
Volume76
Pages103009
Publication date2022-06-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2212-4209
PublisherElsevier BV (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1016/j.ijdrr.2022.103009
OpenAlexW4225117753
LanguageEN
References cited58

The alpine infrastructure of trails and huts enables access to the Alps and is an essential element of summer tourism. Mass movements, whose frequency and magnitude are expected to increase due to extreme rainfall events associated with climate change, frequently affect this infrastructure. Alpine associations need to adopt new ways within their management and maintenance to cope with the expected effects. An option is the use of susceptibility maps to assess the impact of mass movements on the alpine infrastructure network at a regional scale. Thus, this study aimed to assess the mass movement susceptibility of alpine hut and trail infrastructure in a popular hiking area in the Salzkammergut region in Austria. Two statistical susceptibility mapping approaches (logistic regression and informative value) were applied, assessed for their accuracy, and compared. The susceptibility of the alpine infrastructure to mass movements was calculated for trails and huts. Field validation was performed in a mass movement hotspot within the study area. The resulting mass movement susceptibility maps show similar patterns for areas with low and high susceptibility for both methods but are influenced by the completeness of the mass movement inventory and the quality of the conditioning factors. Both methods presented a prediction rate above 68%, with a higher rate for the logistic regression method. The informative value, however, presented more reliable results during the field validation. Discussions with Alpine associations show the potential of susceptibility mapping to aid strategic alpine infrastructure management by providing an overview of susceptible alpine trails and huts

Environmental resource management · Geography · Logistic regression · Mass movement · Physical geography · Statistics · Tourism · Cryospheric studies and observations · Environmental Science · Fire effects on ecosystems · Landslides and related hazards · Mathematics · Geology

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Open DOIOpen Access