I got to thinking about this after a group of students contacted me from Florida International University. They had been out making observations of the “King Tide” event on October 9, something that happens annually, when the moon has its closest and most powerful alignment with the earth, and tidal forces are strongly activated.
The students wanted to know more about sea level rise, and its impact on their area – Sea Level 101.
I told them, among other things, if they had not read Jeff Goodell’s Rolling Stone piece “Goodbye Miami”, they should do so now.
That prompted me to give Jeff a call, and do a little digging. What emerged is, this is not a regional problem – the management of coastal areas affected by sea level rise and flooding will require a national dialogue. Think, New Orleans, after Katrina – times 50.
I found myself telling people how, our image of sea level rise is most often the towering waves washing thru the city, like in sci-fi movies of the past. In reality, the process will be less like the Deluge and more like water torture – drip by drip, millimeter by millimeter – as water systems, real estate, infrastructure, and habitations near the coast are, bit by bit, nibbled away year after yeat – occasionally punctuated by climate-enhanced and sea-level-pumped storm systems, that will make us pine for the simpler days of Superstorm Sandy.
Here again is part of the interview with Jeff:
Reblogged this on synthetic_zero and commented:
that sinking feeling…
Great video. Those cars driving through the saltwater. They’ll be junk in a few years. People are totally ignorant about this. I guess they see the commercials where a car is being driven on the beach through the surf. It’s much worse than the damage done by salted streets up north. I now live near Galveston but used to live in the upper midwest and have always maintained my own vehicles. Even immediately taking the car to a car wash doesn’t prevent all the damage.
I read an article a few months ago that went something like, “If we don’t pretend it’s not happening, then there will be a run on real property equity which then causes property taxes to be substantially lower, making it that much more difficult to buy water pumps and mitigation tools. Therefore we must all pretend it’s not happening”. In other words they want to delay popping a huge asset bubble.
Great video, it’s going to get very ugly.
Glad I got to visit Miami a couple of times before it gets abandoned!
Of large countries, the USA’s lower-48 has two long coastlines with substantial development. Coastal cities, especially on rivermouths, are good transport hubs.
Consider consider contrast with Russia or even Canada, both of which have huge coastlines, but most of their big cities are inland, excepting Vancouver/Victoria and St. Petersburg.
Coastal cities have helped make the USA richer….