Will the post Irene clean-up do more damage to the environment?
Governor Andrew Cuomo moved quickly after tropical storm Irene blew through Upstate New York, using his executive authority to suspend a wide range of environmental laws — from the state wetlands act to all Adirondack Park Agency regulations.
The last week or so, I’ve seen things I never thought I would see in the Adirondacks. Massive backhoes rumbling through riverbeds. Road crews dumping gravel and other fill next to trout streams without setting up silt barriers.
The reasons for this haste are obvious: People’s lives are in disarray. Winter is coming. We have to move fast to rebuild communities and businesses and vital highways before the snow flies.
We also know that it is often possible to move quickly without doing undue harm to the environment.
New York’s Transportation department accelerated the Champlain bridge project, bringing it close to completion in a fraction of the time originally predicted — without doing any significant damage to the lake’s ecosystems or habitats.
But it’s only reasonable to ask what price we may be paying for the speed of the post-Irene clean-up effort.
What happens, for example, if a landowner on one section of a river or brook uses a bulldozer to channelizes a stream or river in a certain way — without coordinating with neighbors downstream?
Are there crucial populations of trout and other wildlife in sections of these rivers that warrant special care and attention?
Are we missing opportunities to rebuild in better and smarter ways, moving septic systems further away from riverbanks, for example, or leaving in place more oxbows and gravel bars that might slow future flood surges?
Are we rebuilding roads and highways in the right places, or are we setting ourselves up for future wash-outs?
I know it’s difficult to think broadly about these questions at a moment like this, but Irene triggered the second major flood in a handful of months.
Some scientists and government officials think in the era of climate change, more storms like Irene are likely.
When I interviewed state Senator Betty Little this week, she firmly supported suspending environmental rules in the flood-stricken areas, calling it a “great decision.”
But she also told NCPR that it is time to think bigger and deeper.
“One of the things we have to start thinking about though is how we prevent this? We have too many floods. The rivers aren’t as deep as they used to be. And I don’t think anyone is even looking at that. I think we need to have the Corps of Engineers and the Soil and Water and everyone else [look for solutions]. The amount of stones and siltand leaves that has accumulated in these rivers, the water has nowhere to go. We have to do something to prevent this from happening.”
So what do you think? As the clean-up continues in your community, can we start taking steps toward a better, more sustainable relationship to these streams and rivers?
Or is it too soon still to do anything more than bail out our basements? As always, your comments welcome.
Tags: adirondacks, environment, irene
Brian,
Your concerns are well founded and need to be addressed. I would hope some people are doing just that and not acting as though Cuomo invited everyone to a Toga party.
For too long money needed for maintenance and upgrades of bridges and roads has not been spent to keep budgets down. I think some of the problems experienced can be directly related to this “let’s not spend any money” philosophy.
Also, some people have been courting disaster here, there and everywhere by building too close to the waterfront and in flood plains. Bail them out once. Don’t bail them out again.
the rivers aren’t as deep as they used to be? Stormwater runoff from impervious areas (i.e. roofs and roads) causes deeper channels to form in streams and rivers, causing steep, unstable banks and starting a chain reaction of bank erosion. Sediment deposition didn’t cause these floods, over 5 inches of rain in a day caused the floods.
Sen. Little may want to ask the questions, but I bet she won’t like the answers she gets: do not build anything near rivers, abandon any structure that lies within a 100-year floodplain. Only if that occurs can we be sure that “This Won’t Ever Happen Again”. There is NOTHING we can “do” about this problem. Nature will do what she wants to. To think that we can engineer our way out of getting flooded is simplistic thinking.
How’s that project going to abandon the lower 9th ward in New Orleans coming along, anyway?
The last thing the adirondack park needs is Betty Little and the corp deciding what to do ! Thanks Andy, pay real attention to what your people are doing for once and make sure they do it right.
Water runs downhill. It’s just a fact of nature. In the mountains the hills are big and the valleys are small so when you get a lot of rain the valleys flood. How is the corps of engineers going to change that? What we’re dealing with is an infrequent act of nature that is becoming more frequent because of climate change which is happening whether you want to believe it or not and regardless of what is causing it. We can’t build on the summits for both environmental and practical reasons. We can’t build on the slopes because they slide and we can’t build at the bottom because it floods. I agree with Verplanck, there is nothing we can do to keep it from ever happening again. What we have to do is be better prepared to deal with it when it does happen.
I think we might get consensus on this! I agree with Verplanck and Jim, we can’t do anything to make nature behave in a way that works better for us. We have to get out of nature’s way. Look what all our levee-building on the Mississippi has wrought. Look at the foolish building throughout the canyons in California, where multimillion-dollar homes burn down and slide away on a regular basis. If our hubris carries us to a point where we think we can win a bet against the forces of nature, then we deserve what we get.
Betty Little’s remarks echo what I have been hearing around town here in Keene/Keene Valley from some people. That the flooding is the result of the streams and rivers somehow not being deep enough… or being too full of (natural) debris.
I’ve even heard some blame the APA and DEC for this. As in, we haven’t been allowed to deepen the streams and rivers or clear out trees that fall, etc etc.
It is amazing to listen to. The solution for some people really seems to be driving a backhoe the distance of a river… making it deeper and wider and clearing it of silt and leaves.
I thought this sort of silliness was limited to diner counter conversations – scary to think our state senator is having the same thoughts!
Hopefully cooler, smarter heads will prevail… and hopefully the APA and DEC are getting involved in this cleanup despite the suspension of the permit process.
Dave,
That is not good. I hope there are some fluvial geomorphologists over there who can knock some sense into these people.
If you make a waterbody deeper, you expand the width of the river as the banks erode, making the problem (effects on nearby properies) worse. Do people think that rivers and streams have vertical sides?
“I agree with Verplanck and Jim, we can’t do anything to make nature behave in a way that works better for us.”
Will you are right to a point. But I was in Boston recently look at how much of that city is now sitting on what used to be water. You can do it, but it isn’t easy, and you better be careful.
Even if you set aside the environmental concerns that Brain mentions, I think that most of these things (by necessity) are being built back up in places where they will again get washed away. Look at the Rt 73 problems that road is built on a bed of sand and cobbles this washout should not be any big surprise. Why does the Keene Valley firehouse need to be build right next to a river? If you want to live next to the water you better be ready to get your feet wet once an while.
“fluvial geomorphologists” verplank, that is the word(s) of the day for sure.
The basic problem, actually just one problem, is humans thinking the Earth is a stagnant, non living thing.
It is alive and like all living things it changes. It also has a tendency to react negatively to any attacks on it by humans. It really doesn’t care what we want or think. It has a mind of its own and will certainly outlive us.
It is the Keene firehouse (Keene Valley’s is in a pretty safe area)… and I think whether it should be rebuilt in the same spot is an important question.
I’ve heard people suggest it shouldn’t, but am unaware of what the real plans are. That decision would involve budgets, available land, and whether it is a complete rebuild or more of a repair to what was left of the existing structure.
I certainly won’t criticize any of these original building locations. Until recently, flooding in these areas was just not a concern. But moving forward I think all of these communities need to begin thinking about where they build and re-build. We face a new climate reality – I’d just assume not arm wrestle with it.
“Governor Andrew Cuomo moved quickly after tropical storm Irene blew through Upstate New York, using his executive authority to suspend a wide range of environmental laws — from the state wetlands act to all Adirondack Park Agency regulations.”
Brain, is this accurate reporting? The “permitting process” had been suspended. He did not “suspend” the laws did he?
You still need to conduct repairs and rebuilding in accordance with Environmental law. For example you can’t move a house that was 100 feet from the water to 50 feet. You still need to follow the rules and the DEC and APA staff should be out there helping folks with that. You just get to skip the permits and the paperwork. If the laws are well written and clear than we should all be able to follow them without the help of the middle man. If we break them then we need to be held accountable permit or no permit.
Dave, thanks for the correction on the firehouse.
As time goes by it gets more and more difficult to listen to anything Betty Little says. Did she go to the Rick Perry school of science? Let’s face it, if her brother wasn’t the Warren County Republican chairman she would never have had a Senate seat.
Betty Little needs to watch the end of her garden hose running into the ground for a little while before she pretends to know anything about geomorphama-whatever….
I think Betty Little is actually responding to widespread concerns in the North Country — from the Salmon River to the Ausable River — that siltation and other changes have left rivers more vulnerable to flooding.
As some of you point out, those things have been complicated a lot by development pressure, which has led to more stormwater run-off, etc.
But this Irene event also flattened or de-channeled sections of the Ausable River in ways that could be really problematic going forward, and no one I’m speaking with thinks that was human-caused.
Short of depopulating a huge part of the Ausable River flood plain, I think this also does raise legitimate questions.
–Brian, NCPR
Brian,
On one hand, there’s the statement that “siltation and other changes have left rivers more vulnerable to flooding”. On the other, no one thinks this was human-caused.
Siltation and changes in the river ARE man-made issues. Siltation comes from dirt washed off from roads going into the rivers. We think rivers are fixed routes, and designed structures to keep them in that route (e.g build Rt 73 right next to it and armor the heck out of the riverbank). When a big storm came, nature erased all of our assumptions as to what a river should be.
I think it would be a real public service to get a fluvial geomorphologist (i.e. river expert) and have he/she explain what happened, and put our built environment into that context. Sounds like there is a LOT of ignorance about why this happened, and if no lessons are learned, then we are in store for this to happen again.
Betty Littles’ statement, if accurately quoted, proves again that she is not a very deep thinker. She regularly makes ridiculous proclamations on a variety of subjects she obviously knows nothing about.
Verplank has it right. Streams are complex and dynamic systems. What you do in one spot can affect property upstream and downstream. Heck, a tree falling across a stream can divert water to one bank and set off a number of drastic changes downstream. Betty Little’s statement is pure ignorance. It is impossible to deepen streams enough to create sufficient capacity that would prevent flooding. Streams have channels, floodways and floodplains. If you build something in the floodplain it is only a matter of time before it gets wet. And with on-going climate change, which is warming the planet, more moisture is available for these storms. Floodplain maps will have to be revised to higher elevations. Yes, some sections of streams could benefit from limited adjustments to repair or improve habitat, but there is nothing you can do prevent streams from filling the floodpain when faced with an overwhelming amount of water.