Roughly 100 residents came to a public meeting on Tuesday to talk about three possible anti-flooding proposals for Hoboken that would include building controversial walls to keep the water out.
An engineer’s presentation showed that the least popular flood wall to be built near the Hudson River would be the most effective of three proposed plans, keeping 98 percent of the city dry during a storm surge. Walls that run from Weehawken to northern Hoboken would keep approximately 85 percent of the area dry.
The “Rebuild by Design Community Presentation of Flood Modeling” was an opportunity for residents to ask questions of an engineering firm and a knowledgeable professor of ocean engineering about the three potential choices.
The plans, which will be funded by the federal government as part of its 2013 “Rebuild by Design” environmental competition, were presented on Tuesday, July 12 in the Babbio Center of the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken.
“There are wonderful ways to create these waterfront breakfronts … that are not the Berlin wall.” — Gary Holtzman
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The barriers take different paths in each of the three alternatives.
Alternative 1, the waterfront alignment, begins in Weehawken on Harbor Boulevard and eventually proceeds south along Sinatra Drive to Castle Point. The southern end of the wall will stretch along Sinatra Drive and head west along Observer Highway and through the transit yard.
Alternative 2, the 15th Street alignment, starts in Weehawken by the 19th Street light rail station and heads east on 15th Street before heading south on Washington Street.
The final alternative, Alternative 3, also known as the “Alleyway Alignment,” also begins at the 19th Street light rail station and follows the rail track down into Weehawken Cove and into Harborside Park. It then turns east up the alleyway located between 14th and 15th streets and turns south on Washington Street for about a block.
More questions
The newest presentation was met with additional questions, opposition, and some understanding from residents.
The Rebuild by Design project aims to reduce flooding in Hoboken and its surrounding areas due to storm surges, high tides, and heavy rainfalls. Hoboken is geographically close to water level and has portions that flood during severe storms, particularly at high tide. Most of the town, particularly the southern and western portions, suffered flooding and power outages during Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
The federal government launched its “Rebuild by Design” competition in 2013 to look at proposals from design teams on how to improve environmental conditions around the country. A team from Hoboken was among the winners, proposing plans that also covered portions of nearby Weehawken and Jersey City.
But not everyone is on board with the plans.
Four components
The proposed projects consist of four components to combat flooding: resist, delay, store, and discharge.
Tuesday night’s presentation focused on the first component, entitled “Resist.” This section of the project attempts to prevent flooding using infrastructure like floodwalls, seawalls, and soft landscaping such as berms and levees.
At this meeting, residents voiced similar objections to last year’s. They asked if their buildings would be structurally impacted by the walls during serious storms.
“How do we know our glass doors are not going to get blown in by the force of the water?” said one Jersey City resident who said the wall in alternative 2 would run behind her building. She did not want her name used.
Other residents acknowledged that something still has to be done to combat flooding. (In the last five years, the city has added flood pumps and parks to retain floodwater, but they are looking to do more.)
Gary Holtzman, a resident of Hoboken for 30 years, chairman of the Planning Board, and husband of city Zoning Officer Ann Holtzman, said that he is willing to make a sacrifice because his own home has suffered damage from flooding.
“I’m willing to give up something to get something,” said Holtzman. “We need to move forward. I’m willing to give up my view corridor or complete access to the waterfront to get a benefit out of it.”
“It can be wonderful,” continued Holtzman. “It can be integrated into a park… there are wonderful ways to create these waterfront breakfronts and ways to stop these storm surges that are not the Berlin wall.”
Some residents took issue with the H5 pump that is meant to prevent heavy rainfall from overflowing the sewer lines and flooding back into the city’s lowest-lying streets. Among them, some felt that large sewers could do the job while others found fault with the flood modeling animation at the meeting, saying it didn’t take the new pump into account.
Residents asked if the pump would help mitigate storm surge water in the case of another flood. But Ken Spahn of Virginia-based Dewberry Engineering Inc, the firm working on the Rebuild by Design project, said that was not the pump’s intent, as it is “not designed to pump out sea water.”
Spahn said that the H5 pump is included in the rainwater animation that will be presented in the next meeting on July 28 from 6:30 to 8:30 at the Hoboken High School Cafeteria.
The federal money for the project, totaling $230 million, was awarded for the city’s Rebuild by Design concept by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
The current date for completion of the new infrastructure is set for 2022. The city must decide on a final plan in the next few years.
What are the chances with each plan?
The meeting included a PowerPoint presentation by Spahn and Professor of Ocean Engineering Dr. Alan F. Blumberg from Stevens Institute of Technology.
Blumberg explained how flood modeling is done, how data for the project was collected, and the probability of surge storms affecting Hoboken. Blumberg said that a 10-year storm has a 10 percent chance of occurring, which results in roughly one to two feet of water and is the same likelihood of a person being born left-handed.
A 50-year event has a 2 percent chance of occurring each year. It would result in three to six feet of water, according to Blumberg. He said this has the same likelihood of happening as a person being bitten by a dog each year.
A 100-year storm has a 1 percent chance of occurring in a year, which would result in five to eight feet of water rising in Hoboken. He said it’s not a completely unlikely occurrence. He compared this to the probability of the average American adult earning over $22,500 per year, noting that such a storm is rare but not as rare as people might think. (The presentation used a figure of $25,000, which Blumberg corrected in a later interview.)
He equated Superstorm Sandy to a 260-year event and said it had a 0.4 percent reoccurrence probability with six to nine feet of water. He explained, “This is the same probability of having identical twins.”
Blumberg said his favorite alternative is the Alleyway alignment, as he lives in the Tea Building on 14th Street and this alternative distances his home from the wall.
Spahn showed through computer animation how the proposed three different alternatives would affect flooding in Hoboken and its surrounding areas if a 100-year storm struck Hoboken.
The animation for Alternative 1, the relatively unpopular Waterfront Alignment, showed that roughly 98 percent of Hoboken and surrounding areas would remain dry if that plan was chosen.
Alternatives 2 and 3 showed more flooding than Alternative 1. The second and third alternatives provide 86 and 85 percent flood protection respectively.
Spahn said “The key takeaway is that all alternatives provide significant flood reduction benefits to the project area, also areas adjacent to the technical project area could receive some benefits from this, [and that] there are some locations with a one inch or less increase in flooding.”