Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1987/02/23/atchafalaya


Read it. Think about it. No more levees and dams. Take them all out, and move people out of harm's way.

Low lying cities need to mitigate the many years of mistakes made on stormwater management. The time is now.

Some waters are safe to live on, such as the Great Lakes. Others, not so much. We do not have gills.

Settlements were built near water because water is the most cost effective way to move large quantities of goods.  That hasn't changed.  The working class that keeps that industry moving cannot afford a long commute and has to live near the water's edge.  That puts in in harm's way when a hurricane hits.  Moving everyone inland is not going to be a viable solution.

The cost of moving populations away from flood plains is obviously something that means it won't happen aside from some sparsely populated areas that are in bad shape.

We think we can control Nature, still.

It boggles my mind to try and think about what this would mean in Cincinnati alone.

Covington, KY sits behind large dikes and of course the Ohio River is made navigable only by use of dams.

The 1937 Cincinnati flood was major for this part of the world.

The flood plain on which much of Cincy is located has a small river running through the middle of it that the Ohio backs into during floods except for the flood gates.  They pump the Mill Creek water over the flood gate in effect to prevent flooding.

It works.  I have seen one or two rather large floods here in my life in Cincy but nothing that did much damage to infrastructure.  Without all of the dikes, the Cincy flood plain would have to be abandoned.

That would be almost all of the built up urban area.

As I said, I can't begin to imagine how Cincy would do this, ever.  There isn't even a "start small" notional concept around.

It's not going to happen, so I guess thinking about it is futile anyway.