Flood dynamics in urbanised landscapes: 100 years of climate and humans’ interaction

Raising interest in the interaction between humans and climate drivers to understand the past and current development of floods in urbanised landscapes is of great importance. This study presents a regional screening of land-use, rainfall regime and flood dynamics in north-eastern Italy, covering the timeframe 1900–2010. This analysis suggests that, statistically, both climate and land-use have been contributing to a significant increase of the contribution of short duration floods to the increase in the number of flooded locations. The analysis also suggests that interaction arises, determining land-use dynamics to couple with climatic changes influencing the flood aggressiveness simultaneously. Given that it is not possible to control the climatic trend, an effective disaster management clearly needs an integrated approach to land planning and supervision. This research shows that land management and planning should include the investigation of the location of the past and future social and economic drivers for development, as well as past and current climatic trends.