3 ms·

I think flooding in the midwest is largely due to farming practices. Lands are engineered to immediately dump excess rain into the local streams which feed the

I think flooding in the midwest is largely due to farming practices. Lands are engineered to immediately dump excess rain into the local streams which feed the rivers and end up flooding some town in Iowa. If the farm land was allowed to flood this would happen far less often. Finding a way to collect that rain and get it down into the aquafer would also mean they wouldn't have to keep drilling deeper wells to reach it.

lostapathy 4y ago
Related to this is that we insist on farming flood plains, and then "protecting" them with levees. Nature already has a perfectly good system to deal with excess rain. Rivers expand to fill flood plains to buffer the excess water. Unfortunately we've blocked nature from doing this by building levees and otherwise channelizing rivers. We've "gotten away with it" in large part, but ultimately somewhere is going to flood as climate events get more extreme. We'd be better off choosing to let farm fields flood a little on semi-regular occasions than building levees to the point that flood stage raises even higher and it's a complete catastrophe when a levee breaches near a city or town.
- engineer_22 4y ago
  -> We'd be better off... I think it's not so simple. Flood plains are agriculturally very productive, close to a river it's near transportation and a source of fresh water. Famously, the 4 Cradles of Civilization developed along rivers. I dont think we can assume we can simply abandon the riparian zones and continue along for the better.
  - lostapathy 4y ago
    Historically, those cradles of civilization were exceedingly productive because some years the flood plains flooded, not in spite of it.
asdff 4y ago
There's a lot of localized flooding happening too with these summer rainstorms. You have these 100 year old storm sewer systems that need to be replaced. You end up with flooded out roads nowhere near rivers, and flooded basements. It's not "row a boat through it" flooding, but its a significant cost for the municipalities and the people who have to deal with flooded basements.
- rbanffy 4y ago
  In that regard, I don’t think it’s reasonable to allow construction of basements in those places. It makes more sense to think about building on stilts.

lostapathy 4y ago

Related to this is that we insist on farming flood plains, and then "protecting" them with levees. Nature already has a perfectly good system to deal with excess rain. Rivers expand to fill flood plains to buffer the excess water. Unfortunately we've blocked nature from doing this by building levees and otherwise channelizing rivers. We've "gotten away with it" in large part, but ultimately somewhere is going to flood as climate events get more extreme. We'd be better off choosing to let farm fields flood a little on semi-regular occasions than building levees to the point that flood stage raises even higher and it's a complete catastrophe when a levee breaches near a city or town.

engineer_22 4y ago
-> We'd be better off... I think it's not so simple. Flood plains are agriculturally very productive, close to a river it's near transportation and a source of fresh water. Famously, the 4 Cradles of Civilization developed along rivers. I dont think we can assume we can simply abandon the riparian zones and continue along for the better.
- lostapathy 4y ago
  Historically, those cradles of civilization were exceedingly productive because some years the flood plains flooded, not in spite of it.

asdff 4y ago

There's a lot of localized flooding happening too with these summer rainstorms. You have these 100 year old storm sewer systems that need to be replaced. You end up with flooded out roads nowhere near rivers, and flooded basements. It's not "row a boat through it" flooding, but its a significant cost for the municipalities and the people who have to deal with flooded basements.

rbanffy 4y ago
In that regard, I don’t think it’s reasonable to allow construction of basements in those places. It makes more sense to think about building on stilts.