Buying property on Red River flood plains (Fargo, Grand Forks: houses, construction)

[ShadowCaver]

Originally Posted by Slig

I was wondering what other people's thoughts are on buying property along the flood plains and more specifically, those along the Red River in Grand Forks and Fargo.

I personally find it irresponsible, especially when the federal government ends up covering 75% of the recovery costs incurred by local and state governments for flood damage and US citizens nationwide contribute to repair very preventable damages. If people wouldn't have invested in property and infrastructure in these flood plains all of these incurred costs wouldn't have happened. Those people should have known the risks involved and based on probability knew that sooner or later they would require government aid to save their property.

When I began the search for my first home the first place I looked was on the West Side of St. Paul and the first thing my realtor said was that I should be careful with that area as some of the property there is on a flood plain. I looked up where the flood plain was and excluded that property from my search. BOOM! problem solved!

Am I way off base for feeling this way? If I'm misinformed on this matter I'd love to be enlightened.

I understand your thoughts, as I've had 'em too... esp. when looking at places around the St Louis, MO area, where communities and development spring up upon known floodplains, protected by tax-payer support levees. IMHO, humans spend too much, way too much, energy and dollars and resources in trying to 'fight' mother nature, instead of understanding and then working with her. At the end of the day, we humans can not 'win', but at best can be at a stalemate. Weather is unpredictable, we ain't gonna control it [lest not to any extent in the near future]. Water, be it rain or humidity or other forms, is unrelenting, powerful, and unforgiving - it will go where it wants, where it needs to go. Nature is a balancing act... and too often humans forget that we should balance with, not against her.

Specifically now to the ND situation, yea, honestly, IMHO, w/o any offense necessarily towards you, but you are off-base here, as I do not believe its a similar situation to most other areas, where goof-balls and greed has led idiots to build w/in floodplains, just to have development there. Instead, in this area, its more about the farmers, the ranchers, those that built in these areas so that they can help feed the rest of the country, even the world.

[Reziac]

I remember a flood in the early 1960s, when I was living in Moorhead, that put a foot or two of water in all of downtown Fargo. (All the department and clothing stores had an enormous sidewalk sale afterward to move out damaged merchandise.) How does this flood compare?? anyone else want to admit to being old enough to remember it?

I also remember one year when water covered just about everything in sight clear out to Valley City. Almost anywhere that had trees (all the creek beds) had standing water several feet deep, and in spots it was water far as you could see. Mighta been the same year, I don't recall by now.

I too feel that it is irresponsible to build on flood plain, tho there are going to be some marginal areas, especially on nearly-flat dry lake beds like the Red River valley (and Devil's Lake... good gods, what does it think it is these days, an ocean?!) If you look back at maps from before 1900, they show a lot of the area affected today as UNDER WATER (including all of the newly-flooded areas around Devil's Lake). So it's not like there's been a total lack of historical warning.

But over the past couple rather-dry decades, people are building housing developments down in 10-year floodplain in some areas -- how is that safe or sane?

As someone else notes, floodplain is the best and most irreplaceable farmland (even tho sometimes it gets hammered by Mother Nature) and it's a lot saner and safer to preserve it for agriculture regardless.

Some good links:

Fargo flood info:
http://www.ndsu.nodak.edu/fargoflood/
especially the photos here
http://www.ndsu.edu/fargo_geology/floodphotos.htm

Note the same housing development is underwater several different years!

[Fischer_girl]

3-Oaks... consider your reputation increased...again! I LOVE people that know the facts!

[Slig]

Thanks for the informative comments. If you feel my post was in poor taste or idiotic you are entitled to your opinion. I think anytime something bad happens we must ask questions to find out why it happened and what we can to do prevent it happening going forward, I am not trying to be insulting, just trying to find answers. I remember when the exact same thing happened in Grand Forks in 1997 and a ton of students and staff from my high school spent days up there to help move sandbags. This feels like deja-vu and it's not sitting well with me. I like when problems get corrected, not when the same costly problem happens every 10 years with no resolution.

The insurance comment is pretty important. Everyone who owns property in the flood plain with flood insurance was preparing for the possibility of disaster in a responsible way by protecting their interests. I was annoyed by the people whose homes were flooded out in New Orleans and never cared to cover themselves with water damage/flood insurance. The same goes to the apartment building that burned down in Burnsville, MN a few months ago and alot of the people had no protection for it. In both instances many of these people received large donations and help from private and public sources, which is great. It still annoys me that they become victims for something they could have easily insured themselves.

In a comparable scenario, I hear from some people that there are alot of people who don't want medical insurance....what!? They don't want to be responsible? Who in their right mind wouldn't want medical insurance unless they are pretty sure if something happened to them that there would be somebody to bail them out. I'm just sick of this irresponsible mentality. Whether or not any of this has to relate to the Red River flood I am not completely sure, but I'd like to find out and hold people accountable wherever possible.

[Fischer_girl]

Alright, if I am entitled to my opinion than I am also entitled to express it. Your above comment once again is rediculous. Do you know anything about New Orleans at all?! And have you checked the costs of medical insurance (ESPECIALLY for the individuals who are unemployed due to this economy mess? Just because some of us more fortunate individuals CAN afford these forms of insurance does NOT mean that everyone can! For some people, it is a matter of putting food on the table or buying insurnace. I think you need to open your eyes to surrounding circumstances and other peoples lifestyle and situations. You cannot judge how any other people are living because you have no idea what highways they have traveled down during their lifetime. And, I can bet you one thing... home/flood insurance is a hell of a lot more expensive in New Orleans and other disaster prone areas than the measly premium you pay in the upper midwest. For me its more than double, and I don't even live in a "state of natural disaster"!
Maybe you feel the courage to say the things you do because nothing bad has every happen to you in the form of fire/flood etc. I respect the fact that you want answers..but just what are you doing to do about it anyway? I want answers too, but instead I keep my mouth shut, because people are suffering, and lend a hand as best I can.
People in my neck of the woods approach me every day..whether its in the gas station where they see my ND plates, or when I have to show me ID somewhere.. and constantly tell me how they are so impressed/amazed/in awe etc about how the upper midwest was able to come together and do such an amazing thing for complete strangers. It gives me goose bumps and a firey pride to know I am "one of them" and proud of it! Why can't you be one of the many who appreciats that as well?

[Slig]

Originally Posted by Fischer_girl

Alright, if I am entitled to my opinion than I am also entitled to express it. Your above comment once again is rediculous. Do you know anything about New Orleans at all?! And have you checked the costs of medical insurance (ESPECIALLY for the individuals who are unemployed due to this economy mess? Just because some of us more fortunate individuals CAN afford these forms of insurance does NOT mean that everyone can! For some people, it is a matter of putting food on the table or buying insurnace. I think you need to open your eyes to surrounding circumstances and other peoples lifestyle and situations. You cannot judge how any other people are living because you have no idea what highways they have traveled down during their lifetime. And, I can bet you one thing... home/flood insurance is a hell of a lot more expensive in New Orleans and other disaster prone areas than the measly premium you pay in the upper midwest. For me its more than double, and I don't even live in a "state of natural disaster"!

You combined two seperate points here, first of all in regards to flood insurance, it goes back to previous points I made about taking responsibility in property ownership when it comes to floodplains. Before buying a property, an individual must make the decision on either buying a property outside of the floodplain, or buying in the flood plain and adding in the additional cost of flood insurance. If flood insurance is too expensive to justify a purchase, DON'T BUY A PROPERTY IN THE FRIGGIN' FLOODPLAIN!!!!

Now to comment on the medical insurance issue, I'm making no argument to the cost of medical insurance, I'm saying that regardless of cost, there are people out there who have no interest in obtaining insurance. There are people who can afford it who choose not to, some of these people end up fine, some of them have expensive medical procedures they cannot afford and then whine and cry about it for not being insured. These are the individuals I'm referring to...

Maybe you feel the courage to say the things you do because nothing bad has every happen to you in the form of fire/flood etc. I respect the fact that you want answers..but just what are you doing to do about it anyway? I want answers too, but instead I keep my mouth shut, because people are suffering, and lend a hand as best I can.

That's great but nothing gets done if you keep your mouth shut, you keep playing the "wait until people screw up and then go help them" game and not enforcing responsibility and accountability to people. That doesn't solve problems, it makes them worse. Nothing bad has happened to me in the form of fire/flood because I puposely didn't buy my home on a flood plain and I insure my house for fire damage. Actually, I'm pretty sure I had no choice but to buy homeowner's insurance from a legal standpoint.

People in my neck of the woods approach me every day..whether its in the gas station where they see my ND plates, or when I have to show me ID somewhere.. and constantly tell me how they are so impressed/amazed/in awe etc about how the upper midwest was able to come together and do such an amazing thing for complete strangers. It gives me goose bumps and a firey pride to know I am "one of them" and proud of it! Why can't you be one of the many who appreciats that as well?

I'm not impressed. I'm embarrassed Fargo didn't learn their lesson from what happened in Grand Forks in 1997, it's shameful. And if they don't do anything about it this time after it's all over the same exact thing is going to happen again sooner than later and it'll be deja vu all over again. I spoke with someone yesterday who had several family members living in the Grand Forks area during the 1997 floods. Their homes were lost. They have since learned their lesson and all of them don't live anywhere near a river. That impresses me more than a bunch of people fumbling around trying to stop a flood they weren't prepared for.

[dutchinnd]

I would recommend that folks read the NYTimes article from March 31 "A River Prone to Flooding and Misunderstanding." One of the key points is that the more the hydrologists learn, the more they realize they don't know.
A key image for me in the article was taking a 4'x8' sheet of plywood. Lift it enough to slip a piece of paper underneath it and let it down. The slight increase in elevation represents the slope or angle of drainage of the Red. If you would pour a quart of water on that sheet of plywood, you would see that it would spread everywhere. Also, the slope is changing--the land mass downstream in Canada, which once was under the pressure of glaciers is still springing back from that weight being removed. The slope of the Red is measurably decreasing each year.
So those who are adamant about not allowing people to live in a flood plain--well, in essence they are declaring the entire Red River Valley uninhabitable--from Browns Valley, MN to almost Valley City on the West to Hawley on the east and continuing in that wide swath up to Winnepeg. That would represent the forced relocation of about 250,000 people, the loss of the largest tax base for the state of North Dakota, and the failure to till some of the most fertile soil in the world.

[Slig]

Originally Posted by dutchinnd

I would recommend that folks read the NYTimes article from March 31 "A River Prone to Flooding and Misunderstanding." One of the key points is that the more the hydrologists learn, the more they realize they don't know.
A key image for me in the article was taking a 4'x8' sheet of plywood. Lift it enough to slip a piece of paper underneath it and let it down. The slight increase in elevation represents the slope or angle of drainage of the Red. If you would pour a quart of water on that sheet of plywood, you would see that it would spread everywhere. Also, the slope is changing--the land mass downstream in Canada, which once was under the pressure of glaciers is still springing back from that weight being removed. The slope of the Red is measurably decreasing each year.
So those who are adamant about not allowing people to live in a flood plain--well, in essence they are declaring the entire Red River Valley uninhabitable--from Browns Valley, MN to almost Valley City on the West to Hawley on the east and continuing in that wide swath up to Winnepeg. That would represent the forced relocation of about 250,000 people, the loss of the largest tax base for the state of North Dakota, and the failure to till some of the most fertile soil in the world.

You bring up a really good point, but that doesn't cover the thousands of people who purchased property and ran businesses on already established flood plains. Are you saying that those people should have risked it because there was the possibility that the information wasn't accurate? I personally wouldn't take the risk. For the people who purchased property outside of the already established flood plain and who get flooded because the information was inaccurate, I definitely do sympathize with them, although they should have accepted a certain level of risk for buying property in a river valley.

[Reziac]

Originally Posted by dutchinnd

So those who are adamant about not allowing people to live in a flood plain--well, in essence they are declaring the entire Red River Valley uninhabitable--from Browns Valley, MN to almost Valley City on the West to Hawley on the east and continuing in that wide swath up to Winnepeg. That would represent the forced relocation of about 250,000 people, the loss of the largest tax base for the state of North Dakota, and the failure to till some of the most fertile soil in the world.

While it would be silly to prohibit all use (as you say that's some of the best farmland in the world) it's just plain stupid to build residential housing in areas that you KNOW have been underwater in the relatively recent past. The low population density of farms is one thing, that's a pretty reasonable risk against the gain from tilling the land and feeding millions of of people, even if you do have to rebuild or move some farmhouses every few decades. But building a new housing development, where hundreds or thousands of people will live by choice rather than by professional necessity, on land that was seriously underwater as recently as the 1960s, strikes me as somewhere between slow-learners and outright fraudulent.

You can look at the old flood maps and photos, and make a reasonably good guess as to where is likely to be high-risk for housing developments. If it was underwater during any flood we've got good records for, it's probably a bad idea for residential housing. D'oh!

[Reziac]

Originally Posted by dutchinnd

I would recommend that folks read the NYTimes article from March 31 "A River Prone to Flooding and Misunderstanding." One of the key points is that the more the hydrologists learn, the more they realize they don't know.

Here's the link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/31/us/31red.html

Sounds to me like a few thousand years hence, we may be talking about the Red Sea rather than the Red River.

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