A review of damage mechanisms, prediction methods, and risk management strategies for urban underground steel pipelines

• Review of damage mechanisms in urban underground steel pipeline systems. • Overview of predictive methods for urban steel pipeline damage. • Preemptive risk management strategies for underground steel pipeline systems. • Challenges and future directions for enhancing underground pipeline resilience. As global climate change intensifies and urban pipeline service lifespans extend, ensuring the safety and resilience of subsurface pipeline infrastructure is critical for sustainable development. This review examines typical damage mechanisms at the micro-material, macro-structural, and system levels, and highlights recent advances in predictive methods for steel pipeline failures. Special emphasis is placed on integrating multi-algorithm strategies with physics-informed and data-driven models to improve prediction accuracy and enhance disaster response capabilities. Risk management is emphasized as a core component of resilience governance, and current prevention and control strategies are discussed. Furthermore, the study identifies major challenges to resilient steel pipeline management and proposes strategic pathways involving four key stakeholders: government, industry, academia, and the public. This review provides theoretical insights and practical references for enhancing operational resilience and pre-incident protection of urban pipeline networks under complex and evolving environmental conditions.