The 2017 hurricane season is not yet complete, but Houston’s damage from Hurricane Harvey and Florida’s fallout from Hurricane Irma have already left a severe economic and environmental toll. Yet as disaster turns to recovery in each state, the storms serve as national reminders of resilience challenges facing the country’s most flood-prone areas and the need to help them. Federal recovery efforts are not only receiving more scrutiny, but state and local strategies are also gaining more attention, including adaptive measures and investments in resilient infrastructure.
Flood risks are not just limited to severe storms, though. The ways in which planners, engineers, and other leaders manage and design cities every day plays a huge part too. Houston’s urban sprawl over the past few decades, for instance, exposed its most vulnerable households to greater dangers. Meanwhile, aging infrastructure systems designed to handle excess flows of water–and even daily rainfall–failed to protect the environment or mitigate flood risks.
The Brookings Institute
by Joseph Kane and Ranjitha Shivaram
Thursday, September 21, 2017