Houston Public Media
With six federally-declared flooding disasters in the past five years, Houston is working on a global approach to preparing for the next storm. Some of the city’s goals are outlined in a new report, “Living With Water.”
Houston is one of many cities across the world studying flood risk as part of an international group called 100 Resilient Cities. Houston joined the collaboration in August 2018, one year after Hurricane Harvey, Houston’s chief resilience officer Marissa Aho said.
“Through the same time frame, the city and many partners have been developing the Resilient Houston strategies that will be released soon,” Aho said.
Some of the mitigation strategies they’re studying include widening and expanding bayous, federal detention projects and retrofitting parking lots to store rainwater. The report also takes a closer look at flood risk in three Houston neighborhoods — Independence Heights, Kashmere Gardens and Greenspoint.
In Kashmere Gardens, strategies outlined in the report could more than double the amount of rain storage. But even with all of the proposed improvements, the neighborhood will be able to handle only half the rainfall in a 500-year storm.
“Even when we do all of these things,” Aho said, “there’s still a residual risk that we need to work towards mitigating.”
Full article here.