“Like air pollution, flood risk is a threat that government should be protecting us against.”
—Barry Gardiner
By Alex P. Vidal
I GREW up in a city in the Philippines where flash floods were a normal event.
Every now and then, Ilonggos grappled with flash floods during heavy downpours with or without typhoons. But not anymore today.
Asphalt overlaying and road widening projects had been done at dizzying speed in the 90s; government infrastructure developments have helped improved drainage systems, implemented early warning systems, and promoted responsible land use and construction practices.
Except in some underdeveloped rural areas, Filipinos in general don’t panic anymore if there are flash floods cascading in the metropolis.
But not some people in the United States. Americans are nervous when they see a big amount of water cascading in the Big Apple’s subway after a heavy downpour.
Especially when heavy rain struck in New York City and New Jersey Monday (July 14) night caused a flash flood that killed two Americans.
And to think it was caused “only” by a storm that was reportedly a combination of a low-level jet transporting moisture and a mid-latitude system. It was not even a named storm or a hurricane or a tropical storm.
When flood hit New York City July 14 night, I was sleeping in my apartment; I made the right decision to skip the night shift in my workplace, thus, thank God, I was not among those passengers stranded in the subway.
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At least 2.64 inches of rain reportedly fell in Central Park, shattering the previous July 14 record of 1.47 inches, which was set in 1908.
The city’s sewer system, like the subway, is reportedly more than 100 years old. About 60 percent of New York City has what is known as a combined sewer system, in which a single pipe carries both storm water runoff and sewage, according to the city’s Department of Environmental Protection.
This system can handle only about 1.75 inches of rain per hour, and Monday’s storm reportedly far exceeded that.
Flash flood happened because, according to Klaus Jacob, a geophysicist and professor emeritus at Columbia University who has worked with the city on subway flooding issues, every opening in a subway station, from a staircase to an elevator shaft, is a means of entry for rainwater, as reported by New York Times.
“There are 39,000 open grates that ventilate the subway, and many of them must be closed by hand,” reported the Times. “And while the M.T.A. is developing automatic closures for those vents, it will be expensive. The transit agency has projected it will need an additional $6 billion over 10 years for weather resiliency upgrades, only a portion of which has been funded.”
The New York City subway was inundated with rain on Monday night from severe storms, upending rush-hour commutes as water gushed onto platforms and trains and, in one station, shot up from a manhole like a geyser.
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The Times reported that the subway system, which is more than a century old, is relied on by millions of passengers daily and weaves together the city’s neighborhoods.
“But it has a longstanding infrastructure problem that is only getting worse as rainfall becomes heavier and more frequent because of climate change,” reported the Times.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the state agency that runs the transit system, has already reportedly invested billions of dollars into climate resiliency measures.
But there is no easy fix for subway flooding, and it could take years of cooperation among various government agencies to keep the subways dry, transit experts said.
On Monday, 20 stations were closed while 16 others had delays or partial closures. And as the rainfall deluged some stations but left others relatively unscathed, it demonstrated the unpredictable and hyperlocal nature of how flash flooding affects the city.
Riders like Larry Oquendo, 67, prepare for the worst when they see heavy rain in the forecast. A few years ago, he was stuck at a flooded station where people and rats alike scampered up the stairs to avoid the rising waters, according to the Times.
On Monday night, added the Tims, he canceled his plans to get on the subway. “I knew it was going to be bad,” Mr. Oquendo said. “So I ain’t traveling.”
The M.T.A., which operates the 472 subway stations and Staten Island’s 21 rail stations, said that, despite the shocking scenes on Monday, the system remains durable, and service on subway trains, buses and commuter railroads was back to normal by Tuesday morning.
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The torrential rains that inundated the New York City area left at least two people dead, officials said Tuesday, as road closures and transit disruptions lingered across the region. More than 2 inches of rain fell on Central Park in the span of a single hour on Monday night, the second-wettest hour ever recorded in the city.
A state of emergency was in effect in New Jersey, where Gov. Phil Murphy said flooding in the suburb of Plainfield swept away a vehicle on Monday night, killing two people inside. The sprawling storms swelled waterways up and down the Eastern Seaboard, and forecasters warned that flooding was still possible from Washington, D.C., to the Carolinas.
New York City’s public transit system was largely up and running after the storms sent water cascading into subway stations and bubbling up through sewer drains on Monday night, inundating tracks and trains and leaving some commuters temporarily stranded.
The flooding underscored an issue that some transit and environmental advocates have warned about for years: the inability of the region’s infrastructure to handle increasingly extreme weather.
(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor-in-chief of two leading daily newspapers in Iloilo, Philippines.—Ed)
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