Resilience By Design

Flooding in the East River tunnel of the L train, from the MTA:

Here is a long read from The Guardian on the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, reliance to storms, and design solutions. To give a sense of the awakening to sea-level rise and flooding issues, we now have to add flood maps to our drawings for filing projects with the New York Department of Buildings, to show compliance with the DoB regulations regarding flood protection. I should also add that the first illustration in the Guardian, showing the Big U concept, strikes home for me personally, as my apartment, our office, and my route walking to work are all visible.

I don’t claim to know what the best answer to flooding might be. It could be large-scale infrastructure work like the Big U, or small changes in building design, or a combination of the two, or something else entirely. My gut feeling is that no one else really knows either and therefore the best answer is “all of the above.” Let’s try every feasible idea and see what works.

Edited to add: A tweet this morning alerted me to this article on the topic.