SLPD Editorial - A City Bounded By Rivers Needs To Smarten Up In A Destabilized Climate

[hatrack]

EDIT

If past is prologue, that’s not going to happen. Over the past few days, TV showed a lot of pictures of Gov. Jay Nixon and Sen. Roy Blunt at flood sites, Expressing Concern. Four years ago, after 2011’s Great Flood along the Missouri and Mississippi, both men opposed the Corps of Engineers’ decision to blow a hole in the Birds Point Levee in southeast Missouri to save the city of Cairo, Ill., from disaster. Their concern was for a handful of Missouri farmers, not the people of Cairo. There’s very little to be gained politically from flood mitigation, and a great deal to be lost. There’s no money in flood control, which depends entirely on action by the United States Congress, where money speaks loudest.

The only time there’s consensus for it is when the waters are rising. By the time meetings get held and decisions get made, the waters have receded. The Great Flood of 2011 was followed by the Great Drought of 2012. Since then more flood plain development has been approved. Besides, like generals who always prepare for the last war, we’re always worrying about the last flood and every flood is different. In some places, the Holiday Week flood exceeded high-water marks set by the Great Flood of 1993. But that was a slow-motion catastrophe that unfolded over weeks as rain in the upper basins of the river made its way downstream.

The 2011 flood was a disaster on the Missouri in the western part of the state, but by the time the crest got to St. Louis, the levees raised after 1993 were entirely adequate. They weren’t overtopped. They weren’t undermined by boils. Will they be adequate next time? It depends what the next flood looks like. Pictures and video make every flood look like any other, but that’s an illusion.

EDIT

As systems react to these changes, it suggests to some climate forecasters that we’ll see colder-than-normal temperatures in parts of the United States later this winter. Others aren’t so sure: Climate is weather observed over long periods of time, and at any one time and one place, odd things happen. But wild swings and more frequent extremes are happening as the climate changes. Smart policymakers would read this to mean not only more frequent floods, but more severe weather and deeper droughts. They would not, for example, approve building new homes and shopping centers in 500-year flood plains because nobody knows what that means anymore.

EDIT

http://www.stltoday.com/news/opinion/columns/the-platform/editorial-a-river-city-perpetually-surprised-by-floods-should-wise/article_57b33470-f7b0-5ac5-8fad-100f71c6f1cd.html

[hunter]

1. Mother Nature has been laughing at 21st century flood control improvements in the U.K.

n 2010, a £38m flood defence scheme for Carlisle - which has seen some of the worst flooding - was completed in a bid to protect about 3,000 homes and businesses around the city.

Floods minister Rory Stewart said defences - which have been criticised - had given authorities more time to evacuate people and kept flood levels down.

The defences "held strong" but the huge levels of rain were too much for them, he said.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-35019021

This is just one of many similar stories.

[Nihil]

2. "Smart policymakers"? No such animal.

> more flood plain development has been approved

Stupid, short-sighted, wasteful and bordering on murderous (the decision to build
on a flood plain is deliberately choosing to dismiss the nature of the land for the
sake of short-term profit so if that costs lives, the "deciders" in favour of the plan
need to be punished).