In recent years, floods and climate-induced cataclysms have caused significant annual damage to livelihoods worldwide, with limited research on their vulnerability, impact, resilience, and long-term adaptation strategies in developing countries. In the South Indian State of Kerala, the major flood in 2018 caused immense economic losses in the low-lying and densely populated Alappuzha District. While the region has a heightened risk of periodic flooding, the considerable destruction of buildings and infrastructure highlights the need for effective solutions for flood resilience in the existing housing stock and new construction. In this context, this study examines flood resilience in the built environment of Alappuzha, focusing on flood vulnerability, building practices, and potential approaches suitable for the region that the current literature does not address. This study employs a qualitative research approach to understand current trends in adaptation strategies and the influencing socioeconomic and cultural factors. The study employs various data collection methods, including interviews, site observations, and content analyses of existing government reports, journal articles, and popular media sources. The findings indicate that although there are three types of established flood resilience techniques (static elevated, floating, and amphibious structures), their suitability for the low-lying areas of Alappuzha depends on the geographic, climatic, socioeconomic, and cultural contexts. Stilted houses have become the most common construction method, in response to climatic and socioeconomic conditions. In addition, the findings highlight the bounce-forth resilience quality of amphibious building techniques and suggest further exploration by integrating them with local technologies and materials. The study concludes that a comprehensive approach is needed that integrates traditional and modern knowledge and practices in disaster risk reduction and management to enhance the resilience of the built environment to flooding.

Visual quality assessment has received much attention in research by forest management and landscape researchers after the mid-twentieth century with the advent of legal frameworks enacted to protect natural resources, including scenery. Since then, the field has gained momentum that is mostly attached to landscape change and assessing the environmental impact of changes. Urbanized areas, however, received less attention and just started to receive some exposure in the last two decades (concurrently with the emergence of new technologies of GIS and remote sensing). Developing a comprehensive understanding of the visual quality assessment research requires a reconnaissance survey of its history and the trends of its research growth. This study undertakes an analysis of visual quality assessment literature in the context of urban settings using bibliometric tools. The paper employs quantitative techniques to analyse 3,221 journal papers retrieved from the Web of Science using keywords co-occurrence, citation burst, and direct citation analyses with the help of VOSViewer, CiteSpace, and Gephi software. Here we show the discipline’s status quo, trends, and patterns of development. They confirm the recency of urban-related research. Our study touches on the chronological emergence and decay of major visual quality notions. It also highlights the most central studies and the journals and research groups actively working in the field. Moreover, it points out research gaps related to urban spaces for future studies guidance.