Coastal areas of Texas are advised (and/or required) to evacuate in advance of a major hurricane hit. Galveston was uninhabitable after Ike and Bolivar Peninsul

Coastal areas of Texas are advised (and/or required) to evacuate in advance of a major hurricane hit. Galveston was uninhabitable after Ike and Bolivar Peninsula was literally completely destroyed. Those areas were evacuated, and Houston was begged to stay put so that they could be. And that was the right thing to do. But Harvey was not a direct hurricane hit, and Houston is not coastal. Houston is what it is because it's far enough inland to be reasonably hurricane resistant. And Harvey landed 200 miles away and nobody knew what it would do afterwards, just that it would do it slowly. That's not a situation where you order evacuations. Frankly there's very few situations where Houston can and should be evacuated. The local (and regional!) response has in my opinion been excellent. Loss of life has been very low. It's not over yet, but I've seen single-day flooding events that have been deadlier. Economic damage will be extremely high, but there's really not much to be done about that.