Lisa Jackson, center, head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, tours IJburg, a residential district built on reclaimed land in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Tuesday May 26 2009. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong)
With the high cost of maintenance and the variability of its implementation, rising seas, and changing weather patterns, many are questioning the use of artificial flood control measures such as levees or dykes. Instead, flood control has come to mean either avoiding the floodplain altogether, or developing it in a way that accommodates the natural flood pattern. At least that is what has happened in the Netherlands, a place that was largely created by holding back the seas, and it seems that the Obama Administration may be coming around to the idea itself. Lisa Jackson, head of the US EPA indicated as much during a recent trip to the Netherlands. It also seems to be the thinking in Louisiana as this was the third trip that Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La) has made since Katrina. There has been no word yet if this means that New Orleans will be jacked up on stilts or made to float with the rising water, but it wouldn’t be a bad idea. In any case, the idea of restoring floodplains to their natural state has caught on with some US municipalities as shown in this testimony: Viewpoint: Protecting the Flood Plain.
Tags: civil engineering, development, EPA, floodplain
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