Changes in coastal land use and the reasons for selecting places to live in Banda Aceh 10 years after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami

Ten years after the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 and following a long process of rehabilitation and reconstruction, Aceh has finally recovered. After the tsunami, Aceh experienced a dramatic migration of its coastal population away from the city; however, after 10 years, the population has mostly recovered. As new houses have been built and new economic activities commenced in the coastal areas, there is now concern regarding potential future tsunami risks for the city. The initial rehabilitation and reconstruction plan sought to prevent the construction of any new houses 500 m from the coastline; however, this failed to happen. This paper elucidates the reasons why these new coastal communities chose their new housing areas and examines the coastal land use changes around Banda Aceh 10 years after the Indian Ocean tsunami. Questionnaires were distributed to 457 respondents, and multiple logistic regressions were used to examine the reasons for household location selection and whether a possible future tsunami was a deciding factor. To examine the coastal land use changes, a series of aerial images from the Banda Aceh coastal area were digitised. It was found that tsunami history was not a major factor in new household selection; rather, rents and land prices, distance from work, and family connections were the top three reasons motivating households to select new living places. These changes and new settlements have given the city’s disaster management agency the challenge of building more emergency infrastructure in the coastal areas.