  Understanding sequential community recovery milestones is crucial for
proactive recovery planning and monitoring. This study investigates these
milestones related to population activities to examine their temporal
interdependencies and evaluate the relationship between recovery milestones and
physical (residential property damage) and social vulnerability (household
income). This study leverages post-2017 Hurricane Harvey mobility data from
Harris County to specify and analyze temporal recovery milestones and their
interdependencies. The analysis examined four key milestones: return to
evacuated areas, recovery of essential and nonessential services, and the rate
of home-switch (moving out of residences). Robust linear regression validates
interdependencies between across milestone lags and sequences: achieving
earlier milestones accelerates subsequent recovery milestones. The study thus
identifies six primary recovery milestone sequences. We found that social
vulnerability accounted through the median household income level, rather than
physical vulnerability to flooding accounted through the property damage
extent, correlates with recovery delays between milestones. We studied
variations in recovery sequences across lower and upper quantiles of property
damage extent and median household income: lower property damage extent and
lower household income show greater representation in the (slowest to recover)
sequence, while households with greater damage and higher income are
predominant in the group with the (fastest recovery sequences). Milestone
sequence variability aligns closely with social vulnerability, independent of
physical vulnerability. Understanding the variation in recovery sequences,
milestone interdependencies, and social vulnerability disparities provides
crucial evidence for targeted interventions.
