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The Variable Infiltration Capacity (VIC) hydrologic and river routing model simulates the water and energy fluxes that occur near the land surface and provides useful information regarding the quantity and timing of available water within a watershed system. However, despite its popularity, wider adoption is hampered by the considerable effort required to prepare model inputs and calibrate the model parameters. This study presents a user-friendly software package, named VIC-Automated Setup Toolkit (VIC-ASSIST), accessible through an intuitive MATLAB graphical user interface. VIC-ASSIST enables users to navigate the model building process through prompts and automation, with the intention to promote the use of the model for practical, educational, and research purposes. The automated processes include watershed delineation, climate and geographical input set-up, model parameter calibration, sensitivity analysis, and graphical output generation. We demonstrate the package's utilities in various case studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European ‘Floods Directive’ 2007/60/EC focuses on the development of flood risk maps and management plans on the basis of the most appropriate and advanced tools. This pushed a paradigm shift for moving to sustainable development through processes of stakeholder engagement to improve the efficiency and transparency of decision processes. In this context, this research project developed a free and open-source GIS software, calledFloodRisk, to operatively support stakeholders in their compliance with risk map delineation and the management of current and future flood risk based on their needs for multi-purpose applications. In this paper, a high-resolution impact assessment framework based on 2D inundation modelling with different return periods was used, as input, within theFloodRiskmodel to reconstruct the socio-economic damages based on a case study showing how structural and non-structural measures can significantly decrease the cost of floods for households. The sensitivity of theFloodRiskmodel was also examined and it was found to be highly dependent on the selection of damage functions and the economic values of the exposed assets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]