The Soggy Big Apple: Flash Floods in New York City

    On September 29th, earlier this year, the streets of New York City became flooded from intense rainfall. This flash flood created lots of chaos and damage throughout the city from the streets to the underground transit system (the MTA). My social media was filled with coverage of this tragedy and immediately I thought about how my family was affected since we live in the Bronx. Thankfully my family was not directly affected by the flooding, but they told me about how intense the floods were in some parts of the city. In many videos, you could see the water-covered vehicles up to their wheels, making it difficult to drive in streets from many parts of the city. In other videos, you can see people shocked as they enter train stations to see the train platforms being soaked with water from different parts of the walls and ceiling. This was especially shocking for me to see because I grew up in the city and, during all of high school, I commuted on these same trains that were being flooded in the videos. It’s so interesting to see how a city that “never sleeps” and “is always busy” is disrupted by a geohazard, but many people continue their routines like nothing is really happening.

    A big reason this flooding occurred is due to the climate change that is going on. The melting of ice caps has been causing sea levels to rise. According to Buzzanga et al., there is a general sinking of about 1.6 mm per year. On top of that, New York City’s drainage system is 1.75 inches of rainfall per hour which was not nearly fast enough for the rainfall on the 29th. The Chief Climate Officer Rohit Aggarwala has spoken about the many plans that they have to improve this drainage system like creating basketball courts that are lower in the ground and can hold excess water, planting rain gardens on sidewalks, connecting storm sewers to bodies of water (ponds, rivers, etc.) and even building walls along shoreline to protect from coastal storms. 

    

    Aggarwala also recommends that people start buying flood insurance which is interesting because insurance and why people may not look to invest in insurance is something we have talked about in class and especially applies in New York City. People already see living in New York as expensive and many apartments are so small that it may feel useless to invest in or protect (especially if people live in high apartment buildings).

    In the end, thankfully no deaths or serious injuries were reported due to the flood but I’m sure many homes and businesses had to deal with devastating damages. It will be interesting to see how New York City officials will continue to try and combat the effects of climate change and flooding, but even more incredibly see how New Yorkers will continue to go on with their day-to-day regardless of whatever is going on.

    

Works Cited:

Mcgeehan, P., & Howard, H. (2023, September 29). Why New York City keeps flooding. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/29/nyregion/nyc-sewer-system-infrastructure.html

Picciotto, R. (2023, October 4). New York’s floods weren’t a one-off - here’s how the city is preparing for the future. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/04/new-york-city-flood-infrastructure-climate-chief.html#:~:text=A%20general%20view%20of%20a,States%20on%20September%2029%2C%202023. 

Brett Buzzanga et al., Localized uplift, widespread subsidence, and implications for sea level rise in the New York City metropolitan area. Sci. Adv. 9, eadi8259(2023). DOI:10.1126/sciadv.adi8259