Conservation sign on the seawall. “The algae there shows the mean
high water line,” he says. “It’s been slowly but steadily moving up
against that sign. The water has certainly been rising over the last few
years, though you may not notice the change on a day-to-day basis,” he
says.
New York City, with more than seven million people, spills out over
378 square miles of land separated by the Hudson, East, and Harlem
Rivers, Long Island Sound, and the Atlantic Ocean. The city, one of
America’s most diverse urban centers, is held together by a complex
network of public works infrastructure, including roads, toll bridges,
subway tunnels, water mains, gas lines, and millions of miles of tele-
phone and television cables and electrical conduit.
It is a difficult city to run on a good day: In 1996, a “report card”
prepared by the city’s former U.S. Army Corps of Engineers chief gave
New York’s infrastructure failing grades, particularly for its aging water
mains and solid waste treatment system, which dumps raw sewage
into city harbors during storms.
So what happens when things get really bad? On December 11,
1992, a nor’easter storm hit the great city head-on. With wind gusts of
up to 90 miles per hour and water surges 8 1/2 feet above mean sea
level, New York’s transportation infrastructure sputtered to a halt. Four
million subway riders were stranded. The FDR Drive, the main high-
way along the east side of Manhattan, flooded up to 4 1/2 feet in some
areas, and LaGuardia Airport, only 7 feet above sea level, grounded
flights for the day. In the end, the federal disaster assistance totaled
$233.6 million, according to Environmental Defense.
Was the storm a once-in-a-century fluke? Unlikely. Consider the
summer of 1999, when high temperatures reigned over most of the
eastern United States New York City experienced 27 days with temper-
atures of 90° F or more—double the number in an average year. Stores
sold out of air conditioners, and 200,000 Manhattanites suffered a 19-
hour blackout on July 7 because of excess power demand. Water con-
sumption broke records, and thirty-three people died of heat-related
causes in the city. The heat was accompanied by the worst American
drought since the Dust Bowl of the late 1930s—rainfall in New York
was 8 inches below normal for the summer.
40 Jim Motavalli with Sherry Barnes