Spatio-topological network analysis of hydrological infrastructure as a decision support tool for flood mitigation in coastal mega-cities

Hydrological infrastructure components such as pumps, floodgates, and flood gauges are invaluable assets for mitigating flooding, which threatens millions of lives and damages property worth billions of dollars in coastal mega-cities around the world. By improving the understanding of how these hydrological infrastructure components are both spatially and topologically connected through waterways (rivers, canals, streams, etc.) within coastal mega-cities, more precise decisions can be made regarding the most appropriate hydrological infrastructure components required to mitigate flooding during emergency conditions. This paper explores the use of graph theory to create a spatio-topological model of a real world hydrological infrastructure network for one of the most representative coastal mega-cities—Jakarta, Indonesia. The network is modeled as a directed multigraph, with hydrological infrastructure represented as network nodes and waterways as edges. The article demonstrates how the network model can be used as a real-time decision support tool for responding to flooding events by alerting decision makers to the occurrence of rising water levels in any given area and, suggesting the most appropriate infrastructure components to engage in order to prevent a given area from flooding.