  The return of normalcy to the population's lifestyle is a critical recovery
milestone in the aftermath of disasters, and delayed lifestyle recovery could
lead to significant well-being impacts. Lifestyle recovery captures the
collective effects of population activities and the restoration of
infrastructure and business services. This study uses a novel approach to
leverage privacy-enhanced location intelligence data to characterize
distinctive lifestyle patterns and to unveil recovery trajectories after a
disaster in the context of 2017 Hurricane Harvey in Harris County, Texas. The
analysis integrates multiple data sources to record the number of visits from
home census block groups (CBGs) to different points of interest during the
baseline period and disruptive period. First, primary clustering using k-means
characterized four distinct essential and non-essential lifestyle patterns.
Then, secondary clustering characterized the impact of the hurricane into three
recovery trajectories based on the severity of maximum disruption and duration
of recovery. The results reveal multiple recovery trajectories and durations
within each lifestyle cluster, which imply differential recovery rates among
similar lifestyle and demographic groups. The findings offer a twofold
theoretical significance: (1) lifestyle recovery is a critical milestone that
needs to be examined, quantified, and monitored in the aftermath of disasters;
(2) the spatial structures of cities formed by human mobility and distribution
of facilities and extends the spatial reach of flood impacts on population
lifestyles. The analysis and findings also provide novel data-driven insights
for public official and emergency managers to examine, measure, and monitor a
critical milestone in community recovery trajectory based on the return of
lifestyles to normalcy.
