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theses

The high development pressure in coastal areas overlaps with significant natural hazards, such as storm surge related to flooding caused by hurricanes. Because of this, coastal zone management (CZM) becomes more important. Through CZM programs, the federal government has assisted state governments in improving local coastal planning and management. Studies in the implementation and practice of CZM in the United States include: protection of beaches, estuaries; and redevelopment of urban ports and waterfronts. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has developed land use regulations and technical guidelines as part of the coastal management efforts. Another important program to protect real property owners from severe flood damages on their properties is the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). Therefore, this dissertation investigates the effects of coastal flooding on the dynamics of real property markets. Within the dynamics of real property markets, stakeholders respond to flooding differently based on their roles and interests. Real property market stakeholders’ adaptive behavior in response to coastal flooding is the interest of this dissertation. The complexity of these socio-economic phenomena interacting with ecological phenomena requires research methodologies that are able to analyze both at the aggregate level and at the micro level. Thus, this dissertation employs spatial hedonic regression pricing models that have been used traditionally in property appraisals, and agent-based modeling (ABM) that has recently gotten into attention among researchers as a tool to explore behaviors and emergences. By using a case study of real estate markets in Monmouth County, New Jersey, this dissertation investigates how these markets respond to coastal flooding caused by Hurricane Sandy that made landfall on October 30, 2012. The resulting hedonic regression analyses find that flood risks are capitalized in real property prices. FEMA floodplain maps are found to inform the prices as suggested in lower prices among floodplain properties than similar properties located outside the floodplain. The findings also suggest that flooding affects real properties based on tenureship. Flooding has more impacts on owner-occupied properties than absentee-owner properties. In an analysis of the flood insurance market, the findings suggest that communities are not well-prepared for flooding, particularly coastal flooding caused by Hurricane Sandy. The ABM modeling outputs explore the non-marginal changes in property prices, which include the stakeholders’ flood adaptation behaviors and the emergence of urban disinvestment and population decline caused by the capitalization of flood risks into real property prices.

ETD_8013

Ph.D.

Includes bibliographical references

by Handi Chandra Putra

doi:10.7282/T3Z89G7W

ETD doctoral

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