Preparing for local adaptation: Understanding flood risk perceptions in Pittsburgh

In cities such as Pittsburgh, aging and insufficient infrastructure contributes to flashfloods and numerous combined sewer overflows annually, contaminating streets, basements and waterways. Climate change is expected to further exacerbate this problem by causing more intense and more frequent extreme events in Western Pennsylvania. For a storm water adaptation plan to be implemented successfully, the City of Pittsburgh will need informed public support. One way to achieve public understanding and support is through effective communication of the risks, benefits, and uncertainties of local flooding hazards and adaptation methods. In order to develop risk communications effectively, the City and its partners will need to know what knowledge and attitudes the residents of Pittsburgh already hold about flood risks. To that end we surveyed 1,376 Pittsburgh residents on a variety of flood risk topics through an online or paper survey in Fall 2015. On balance, residents were relatively knowledgeable about storm water and see the City's current infrastructure as being inadequate to meet future risk. Moreover, they see the risk of runoff events as increasing and especially among those who live in hazardous flood areas. Residents expressed interest in having a dedicated fund to deal with runoff events. Among those queried about their willingness-to-pay, those asked to pay $15 were most interested in a dedicated fund and for green infrastructure (as opposed to gray infrastructure) in particular. Finally, while most residents favored green infrastructure in terms of its attractiveness and perceived affects on mitigating climate change many did not see it as effective at addressing flooding as gray infrastructure. We found people understand the risk and are open to doing something about it. However, more guidance and information on appropriate ways to adapt locally in terms that make sense to residents could enhance informed support for adaptation measures.