Sustainability and resilience-driven prioritisation for restoring critical infrastructure after major disasters and conflict

Abstract

Considering the extensive destruction of infrastructural systems worldwide during conflicts, human interventions, climate exacerbations and other disasters, there is urgent need for efficient strategies to facilitate well-informed decisions for infrastructure restoration based on integrated resilience and sustainability. Despite extensive destruction and impact of human interventions, reconstruction prioritisation frameworks for such regions remains underexplored, which has predominantly focused on climate-related hazards. We argue that this gap in the literature creates immense challenges for war-torn countries seeking to align their efforts with external donors and global development goals. This paper introduces a novel framework for planning the recovery of bridge portfolios in conflict-affected regions, using a scoring system that incorporates integrated resilience and sustainability metrics. The framework is applied to a case study of ageing bridges in Ukraine, demonstrating its effectiveness in guiding strategic investment allocation for infrastructure recovery that balances proactive and reactive measures in conflict zones.