Managed retreat: a nationwide study of the local, racially segmented resettlement of homeowners from rising flood risks
Open accessAbstract
The government-funded retreat of homeowners from flood-prone housing is a globally ascendant policy of climate adaptation. Yet, we still know relatively little about some fairly basic questions involving its participants: e.g. How much risk do homeowners tolerate before retreating? Where do they move? Does that move reduce their future flood risk? And, to what extent do answers to these questions vary by the type of racial and ethnic communities in which they live? To answer these questions, we combine novel address-to-address residential history data with future flood risk estimates and indices of local context to better understand how retreat is unfolding across the United States. Results indicate that, when voluntarily undertaken, retreat is a highly local process that yields notable reductions in household flood risk. These movements, however, are racially segmented, with homeowners in majority-White communities being more likely to stay in the face of higher risk and less likely to relocate to nearby areas that are not also majority-White.
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- Authors
- Elliott, J. R., & Wang, Z.
- Affiliations
- Rice University (US)
- Kinder Institute for Urban Research (US)
- Corresponding author
- Elliott, James R
- Venue
- Environmental Research Letters
- Publisher
- IOP Publishing
- Published
- 2023-06-01
- Volume
- 18
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 064050
- ISSN
- 1748-9326 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4380996794
- Cited by
- 26
- References
- 35
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 4
- FWCI
- 2.93
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Environmental Research Letters (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (2116488)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Flood Risk Assessment and Management
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Climate Change, Adaptation, Migration
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Environmental Justice and Health Disparities
- Keywords
- managed retreat, flood risk, homeowners, climate change adaptation, racial segregation, residential mobility, residential history, flood control
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