Hurricane Barriers For NYC

[brunota2003]

While this could "float" in Talking Tropics, it has more to do with Hurricane Preparations than anything:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090530/ap_ ... a_barriers

Here is my question...instead of fighting against the sea, why don't we just start building buildings in flood prone areas on "stilts"? The ground floor or two could be used for parking, making it easy to clean out in the event of a flooding surge, with few electrical equipment to worry about getting ruined (lights). We can use the same design that is used for parking garages that are already built underneath the buildings currently.

Hmm, gee, there is an idea that anyone living right on the coast knows works. As far as subway systems in NY, I like the idea of making it so you can seal them shut...of course for buildings that are already built, you cant do the stilt thing, but you can certainly move the power supplies up a few stories and make it so if the bottom layer does get flooded, at least not too much is damaged.

[Dionne]

It wouldn't matter for NYC. The infrastructure is barely sustainable.

[Persepone]

It would be impossible to "seal" the NYC subways. They were built before the turn of the century. The retrofit, even if technically possible, would be prohibitively expensive. Besides, the subways are probably not the biggest issue. NYC buildings have a tremendous amount of "stuff" underground... And then there are all the underground utilities, etc. ("Dig we must for a growing New York").

[DanKellFla]

Technically, it is a feasible plan. Just very expensive. The Dutch have a smaller scale version in place for years already.