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Book review |
Mouchel Parkman, UK
| The first 250 words of the full text of this article appear below. Images appear only in PDF or full-text views. |
As Dr Lee and Professor Jones declare ‘... the intention of this book is to examine a variety of approaches to landslide risk assessment and management using relevant examples from across the world. It is not intended to be a manual ...’. They have stuck to their intention and this book is much more a discussion about risk assessments and analysis than it is about landslips themselves, the authors assuming that their readers are already knowledgeable about landslips. There is a short section on the classification of types of landslips but this is perfunctory and there is no section on soil and rock mechanics.
The book is split into 7 sections: Section 1 sets the tone with 38 pages on the background to landslip risk assessment and the meaning of hazard and risk; Section 2 is nearly 100 pages on how to determine landslide potential and its hazard numerically while the following 250 pages deal with landslip risk assessment, quantifying landslip probability and the risk of something or someone being damaged. This is followed by the final section on how to progress from numerically assessing the risk to managing it. There is a very substantial list of references and a similarly sized index.
The book is not an easy read and is certainly not for someone primarily wanting to learn about landslips themselves. However, it is a ‘must read’ for someone wanting to know how best to advise decision-makers on where to spend money to alleviate regional risks from land
