Reducing Bushfire Risk by Planning and Design: A Professional Focus

While links between planning and resilience are increasingly touted as fundamental to managing urban settlements, there are limited practical examples. This paper provides an example via regulatory processes, in parallel with the exercise of professional discretion. Using analysis of diverse urban planning proposals in bushfire prone areas of Victoria Australia, a systematic and site-specific approach for bushfire risk assessment is set out. A three-step process is proposed as a basis for delivery of design solutions to manage bushfire risks. The paper concludes by arguing that professional judgement is a fundamental part of bushfire risk reduction within a regulatory framework.     

Are fire services ‘extremely gendered’ organizations? Examining the Country Fire Authority (CFA) in Australia

Emergency management organizations often have military‐based histories and continue to maintain militaristic styles of operation. Similar to the military, these organizations tend to be male dominated and culturally masculinized. The militarization and masculinization of rural fire services in Australia are generally unrecognized but highly important elements defining these organizations, and the example of the Country Fire Authority (CFA) is considered here. Using a cultural artefacts approach, historical and contemporary elements of the CFA's structure and practice are analysed using the concept of an ‘extremely gendered’ organization, with a focus on how the CFA is structurally and culturally gendered. We argue there is value in expanding the notion of ‘extremely gendered’ institutions beyond the military, to include other militarized organizations. Doing so not only helps to better understand and address resistance to change and gender equality measures, it also draws attention to the important role that such organizations play in the greater patriarchal order.     

Integrated Education for Resilient Urban Adaptation: Wildfire Risk Reduction in Australia

Abstract

Urban and regional planning education seeks, often through highly applied teaching, to develop students’ abilities allowing them to work meaningfully on emergent urban and regional issues. However, it is relatively uncommon that education itself develops alongside government policy and research agendas. This paper documents the development of a new tertiary wildfire management qualification prepared in partnership with planning and building agencies after the devastating 2009 Victorian wildfires. It is argued that the process of developing educational outcomes in this case paralleled an interactive and ongoing agenda of research, policy development and education that represents adaptive-ness facilitating resilience as learning and institutional change.     

Institutional Adjustments and Strategic Planning Action: The Case of Victorian Wildfire Planning

This paper provides a critical analysis of the way that practice-based strategic planning in terms of disaster risk reduction occurs, highlighting the drivers and facilitators of change. It documents these in the context of other governmental systems. Examination the changes to wildfire planning policy in Victoria, Australia, following the 2009 Bushfire Season, provides an explanation of the realpolitik of policy formation, management and change, as well as inter-governmental interactions. The findings document and discuss the conditions and reasons for strategic change occurring in the case study.     

Possibilistic scheduling routing for short-notice bushfire emergency evacuation under uncertainties: An Australian case study

This paper aims to develop a capacitated vehicle routing solution to evacuate short-notice evacuees with time windows and disruption risks under uncertainties during a bushfire. A heuristic solution technique is applied to solve the triangular possibilistic model to optimise emergency delivery service. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is evaluated by comparing it with a designed genetic algorithm on sets of 20 numerical examples. The model is then applied to the real case study of 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria, Australia. The results show that it is possible to transfer the last-minute evacuees during the Black Saturday bushfires under the hard time window constraint. Network disruptions however have impact on resource utilisation. The modelling outputs will be useful in the development of emergency plans and evacuation strategies to enhance rapid response to last-minute evacuation in a bushfire emergency.     

Crises and Natural Disasters: a Review of Two Schools of Study Drawing on Australian Wildfire Experience

The connection between “schools” of study focusing on crises and on natural disasters is explored. After considering the rise of separate schools, the article notes significant attempts to integrate them and suggests that, while natural disasters and other big crises have much in common, there are still some important differences that need to be taken into account in designing relevant management systems. Drawing particularly on Australian wildfire experience, the article then looks more briefly at the question of political leadership in disaster situations, and at serious problems that often occur in the reporting of those situations.