CASA DFW Urban Demonstration Network: An Update on a Multi-Sector Partnerships for Research to Operations

Urban areas face increasing socioeconomic vulnerability as population growth has shifted to cities and the frequency and intensity of weather extremes, such as rainfall, thunderstorms, and droughts, is expected to rise over the next decade due to climate change. A new paradigm for hazardous weather warning systems developed by the CASA Engineering Research Center, based on high-resolution, lower atmosphere radar observations that match the spatiotemporal scales of urban decision-making and human behavior, could mitigate this increasing vulnerability. In the past, such an enhancement to the national radar system would be funded through a large federal appropriation; however, given the current economic and political environment, this approach has become less viable.

In response to this trend, CASA is developing a research to operations ecosystem that will create new models for hardware acquisition and operational support for warning systems, while at the same time providing a platform continued research. Our approach focuses on bringing together local, private and federal stakeholders to share in the deployment cost. Goals are to:

1. To quantify the benefits of CASA information to other sensors and to key stakeholders such as storm water departments or the aviation industry. 2. To create a public, private partnership funding model. 3. To conduct translational research and commercialization of sub-components of the CASA system such as radar hardware or the software architecture.

CASA's test-bed is the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex, the 4th largest Metroplex in the nation, where through a collaboration with the North Central Texas Council of Governments, CASA is deploying an 8-node, x-Band radar network. The CASA network will disseminate real-time weather information to public and private stakeholders for decision-making and evaluation as severe weather events occur in the Metroplex. This end-to-end test bed, from observation to human response and economic impact, will serve as a living lab for achieving the goals above. Although the activity is centered in the DFW Metroplex, the model created will be applicable to other urban areas looking to mitigate the negative socioeconomic impacts of hazardous weather.