Sea Level

CLICK HERE - REPORT - Eye of the Storm - Report of the Governor's Commission to Rebuild Texas (168 page .PDF report)

The report calls Hurricane Harvey a warning that should not be ignored. "The enormous toll on individuals, businesses and public infrastructure should provide a wake-up call underlining the urgent need to 'future-proof' the Gulf Coast - and indeed all of Texas - against future disasters.'"

govtech.com - BY ANNA KUCHMENT, THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS / DECEMBER 13, 2018

To protect itself from the next major hurricane, Texas will have to build storm-surge barriers, shore up wetlands, buy out residents who live in vulnerable areas, rethink development plans and raise the first floors of existing buildings, suggests a sweeping new report prepared for Gov. Greg Abbott and released Thursday afternoon. 

The new recommendations come from Abbott's Commission to Rebuild Texas, led by Texas A&M Chancellor John Sharp . . .

The flood maps don’t factor in sea level rise or changes in extreme weather, and many are years out of date. In Mexico Beach, 'minimal-risk' homes were swept away.

insideclimatenews.org - by James Bruggers - November 1, 2018

The official map laid it out for more than 200 homes within the community of Mexico Beach, Florida: the federal government had characterized their flooding risks as minimal, despite their near-beachfront locations.

That meant for them there were no requirements to buy flood insurance, and local residents say many did not.

When Hurricane Michael and its 155-mile-per-hour winds slammed into the town on Oct. 10, with a storm surge of perhaps 19 feet, the result was devastation. An analysis by coastal geologists from Western Carolina University has found that 70 percent of the homes were demolished. Another 10 percent were severely damaged.

The annual king tides are rising in South Florida, causing some flooding in coastal areas.  By Joey Flechas

miamiherald.com - by David Smiley - June 9, 2017

 . . . In order to save Shorecrest, where million-dollar homeowners mingle with middle-class families and blue-collar renters, government officials across the region are now asking whether it ought to be redesigned rather than simply reinforced. Where climate change poster child Miami Beach is investing $500 million in pumps, streets and sea walls in order to fight for every inch of dry land, municipalities on the mainland are exploring what some communities would look like if they were made to accommodate rising seas rather than simply fight them.

One idea likely to be both controversial and expensive: demolishing properties and returning developed areas back to nature.

(CLICK HERE - READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

Two weeks after a king tide flooded parts of Miami-Dade, Broward and Monroe counties, a heavy rain flooded this Miami neighborhood near Coral Way and Southwest 23rd Street on Oct. 6. Jenny Staletovich Miami Herald Staff

Florida has more to lose with sea rise than anywhere else in the U.S., new study says

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Union of Concerned Scientists - Underwater - Rising Seas, Chronic Floods, and the Implications for US Coastal Real Estate (28 page .PDF document)

miamiherald.com - by Alex Harris - June 18, 2018

Florida stands to lose more homes — and real estate value — to sea level rise damage than any other state in the nation this century, according to a new study.

By 2045, nearly 64,000 homes in Florida face flooding every other day. Half of those are in South Florida.

If you buy a house now, before your new mortgage is paid you might have to regularly do the rolled-up-pants, shoes-in-hand commute that has become an enduring image of sea rise.