Is New York saved from the rising sea level?
Adding in green infrastructure systems is not only good for managing water, but also good for communities.
Large parts of the Netherlands are below sea level. They deal with it every day. But they are not the only once.
New York is also figuring out how te respond to major climate disasters like the rising sea level and future hurricanes.
The first 3 actions are:
- giving land back to nature to become a blue-green buffer zone
- in future a ten mile storm wall and waterfront park will protect Lower Manhattan
- preventing coastal erosion management
Sea level rose by 30 centimeters
The sea level around New York City is a foot higher than it was in 1900, making the region more vulnerable to ocean flooding. Sea level rise is projected to accelerate as the century progresses and could reach as high as 75 inches by 2100, according to the recent NPCC report “Sea Level Rise and Coastal Storms”
The New York Governor’s Office of Storm Recovery estimates that Sandy destroyed or damaged upwards of 300,000 homes (including apartments), the bulk of them within New York City. Also damaged were hundreds of thousands of businesses, major mass-transit tunnels and track beds, and more than 2,000 miles of roadway. Total damages for the state are estimated at $32 billion.
For each time period from the 2020s, 2050s, 2080s, and 2100s, sea level is expected to rise a little higher, pushing the floodwaters a little further inland.
1% – 50 square miles
At today’s sea level, the 100-year flood zone is 50 square miles. (there’s currently a 1 percent chance of a flood that would inundate 50 square miles of land in New York City) If we assume 10 inches of sea-level rise in the 2020s, the flood zone becomes 72 square miles in the 2050s, 85 square miles in the 2080s, and 91 square miles in the 2100s as sea level continues to rise.
Related
- Report shows: Sea level is rising fast
- Flood solutions
- Amazing proposals to aim and protect New York against a hurricane
- A 10 mile waterfront park will safe lower Manhattan
- Sea-level rising: Miami glimps at future extremes
- California is Preparing for Sea-Level Extremes
- Flexible flood defence beats rising water levels
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