RealCurrents

Although Houston is very different from New Orleans culturally, we share an understanding of the problem of subsidence and flooding.

Perhaps unlike New Orleans, however (I guess we will learn much more about their system soon), as Houston grew so rapidly in the 1970s and 80s, it quickly was realized that flooding was worsening, and a lot of money was spent in the past 25 years to improve drainage. Those taxes were ones I was always happy to pay! The combination of paving the ground and subsidence (the gradual lowering of the groud level) meant that drainage was steadily worsening, unless something was constantly being done to counter that.

New Orleans is different because it is at or below sea level, and I guess they are going to have to get a lot more aggressive about their drainage problems, which obviously are far worse. Unfortunately, they haven’t had the kind of economic growth that helps to fund big infrastructure work like Houston did.

Here we are in the process of moving water supplies from ground (wells) to surface (lakes) in order to stop subsidence. I don’t see how New Orleans could really do much to raise its elevation, or do what Galveston did, a century ago, raising the entire city by 10-15 feet (houses weren’t built on slabs back then, as they are here now). Maybe what they need is a redundant levee system, with a second berm (wall of dirt) in critical areas to act as a backup.

Though we have spent so much money on drainage improvements here, flooding is still a regular occurence, but usually just in a localized area. Even in some of the nicer parts of town, such as west of the Galleria, street flooding during major downpours is a common occurrence.

I’m not sure if there’s any way to really keep an area from flooding when it’s as flat as Houston or New Orleans, and gets as much rain as we do along the Gulf Coast. Nevertheless, in this part of the country, drainage is something that must be taken very seriously, and I hope that’s one lesson learned from this tragedy.