After $1b spent on flood control projects, why we may not know if they're working (Houston: live, design)

[elnina]

^^^ Absolutely not! The money is there, we should continue every effort to improve drainage and mitigate flooding.
Just it seems that the progress is way too slow.
Since Harris County has until 2026 to spend Harvey relief funds, they should hurry up, otherwise the fund will be wasted or taken away.

[ParaguaneroSwag]

Originally Posted by elnina

^^^ Absolutely not! The money is there, we should continue every effort to improve drainage and mitigate flooding.
Just it seems that the progress is way too slow.
Since Harris County has until 2026 to spend Harvey relief funds, they should hurry up, otherwise the fund will be wasted or taken away.

You posted the article. The articles rhetoric is “this work has been done but we don’t know if it will work”. Ofcourse, I’m over simplifying. But nonetheless that’s not marching with what you’re saying here. Heck, you’re essentially saying the opposite here.

You think progress is slow? Do you think it’s a good idea to build without engineering? Projects should be rushed without their studies being conducted? I guess I agree that it would be cool to see more. But the goal is always to improve no matter how well off you are right now so I’d be saying that.

Harvey relief funds shouldn’t and aren’t the only source of financing for flood control or infrastructure improvements in general. And improvements aren’t just infrastructure related. The lack of preparation was overall worse.

I have definitely have my sets of criticisms to the Harvey response. Being against infrastructure because “I don’t know if it will work” isn’t one of them. I see work being done and I notice 5-7 inch rain events being less impactful than they were 7 years ago. If you can’t improve on routine rain events, you have no chance on taking on a historic rain event.

My biggest criticism comes from regulations on land use being too easy here. We need tighter regulation in terms of where we build. Or atleast how we do build on vulnerable areas. That’s somewhere I’ll definitely agree.

[Mr. Clutch]

Originally Posted by Mr. Clutch

Subjectively... It does seem that the flooding during one of our "normal" heavy rain events does seem a bit better around town than it did 10 or 15 years ago. Obviously we haven't had a Harvey-level event in recent years but those times where we get 5 or 6 inches in a day don't seem to cause as many problems as they used to. YMMV.

Definitely agree with the sentiment that not having a huge storm recently is certainly no excuse to slow these projects.

OK, after driving around tonight, literally a few hours after this post, I ran into all kinds of high water. Nothing that would flood most cars and it does drain pretty quickly but those extreme rain events are still something to behold around here!

[elnina]

Looks pretty soggy...
Most areas got about 2", but some over 3"



Pictures:
https://www.khou.com/article/weather...3-0167128d1f98

[elnina]

Originally Posted by ParaguaneroSwag

You posted the article. The articles rhetoric is “this work has been done but we don’t know if it will work”. Ofcourse, I’m over simplifying. But nonetheless that’s not marching with what you’re saying here. Heck, you’re essentially saying the opposite here.
.

No, my take was - there is money, there are projects to improve flooding areas (hopefully fully approved and ready to go), but so little is done because they think that they might never see big flooding again.
They should hurry up with the work before due date.
Work is NOT done.

Climate is changing, weather is more violent and unpredictable - we definitely need to finish those projects.

Yes, I posted the article - to be aware and perhaps discuss it.
Don't try to put words in my mouth.

[ParaguaneroSwag]

Originally Posted by elnina

No, my take was - there is money, there are projects to improve flooding areas (hopefully fully approved and ready to go), but so little is done because they think that they might never see big flooding again.
They should hurry up with the work before due date.
Work is NOT done.

Climate is changing, weather is more violent and unpredictable - we definitely need to finish those projects.

Yes, I posted the article - to be aware and perhaps discuss it.
Don't try to put words in my mouth.

I’m not putting words in your mouth. Since you posted the article AND titled the post accordingly, I supposed that this was your take. Not building out of uncertainty.

I’m also going to dispute what you’re saying about the money being there ready to be spent. I’m not a politician but there’s enough evidence to show that there are multiple levels of approval needed before anything can take ground. And considering the political circus that the local level politicians have with the state level (Republican vs Democrat), the approvals take way longer than they should.

Where are you seeing that the county is able to freely spend Harvey funds until 2026? And even if that were the case, that’s only one of many different sources of funds. That would have probably been more related.

[houston-nomad]

Weren't the funds for Harris County held up by the state for years, until the county successfully sued?

[ParaguaneroSwag]

Originally Posted by houston-nomad

Weren't the funds for Harris County held up by the state for years, until the county successfully sued?

Yes. Some of them were. That’s the sort of information I’m saying OP is missing out.

[atadytic19]

Originally Posted by bu2

They've done a lot of Sims Bayou projects over the years. Flooding was really bad in the late 70s along Sims.

Sims Bayou are was bad up until the 2000s. It was one of the harder hit areas during Allison. I have two friends who lived a few yards north of Sims (both on the same street) and both have since moved out their parents houses and both said that the water would frequently get up halfway up the front lawn but since the Allison upgrades, only the streets flood. The streets are designed to flood. They serve as channel to direct water to storm drains that lead to Bayous.

It looks like for Sims they dug channels that look like mini Bayous to drain the neighborhoods. Storm drains and the Bayou itself got upgrades as well as parks.

Harvey dumped more water than Allison but the upgrades after Allison definitely prevented neighborhood flooding during Harvey

Originally Posted by houston-nomad

Weren't the funds for Harris County held up by the state for years, until the county successfully sued?

At the bottom of the article that El Nina posted there's a link that says $2B was awarded to Texas for Harvey relief and the Texas government was responsible for allotting funds. I guess Texas decided that Houston and Harris County wasn't affected by Harvey because it allocated $0 to Houston and Harris County for Harvey relief and had to sue to get some funds.

Not sure how they justified not giving Houston anything from the Harvey relief funds when Houston and Harvey are inseparable when talking about recent hurricanes.

[Dopo]

Originally Posted by houston-nomad

Weren't the funds for Harris County held up by the state for years, until the county successfully sued?

Big Texas government at it again