Listen up, prospective Art History PhDs: if you’re not out of here by mid-century, you could be in for a disaster of near-Biblical proporations. From the Voice’s doomsaying coverstory, re: the Manhattanville “bathtub:”
Imagine this scenario, based on Jacob’s research: It’s the year 2065, and Columbia University’s 17-acre West Harlem expansion is abuzz with activity. Students hurry through rainfall along a tree-lined promenade overlooking the Hudson. In a biotechnology lab nearby, scientists are engineering lethal pathogens to respond to the next generation of infectious diseases and bioterrorist threats. Deep down below, engineering majors use the future version of Facebook to instant-message their friends.
Warnings, meanwhile, are steadily being broadcast about an oncoming storm. A Category 2 hurricane with 110-mile-an-hour winds is barreling down on the city—a more frequent occurrence than in decades past. New Yorkers have become familiar with the drill: They evacuate to local shelters set up by the city’s Office of Emergency Management. Over several hours, the Hudson rises 10 feet, flooding the waterfront promenade and the rest of the campus. Many, but perhaps not all, have heeded warnings to leave the deep basement. Damage will be extensive and exorbitantly expensive. And some of the sprawling labs that contain biohazardous material may become another kind of floating threat to the city.
I really, really want to call bullshit on this article, although my ignorance in both climatology and civil engineering prevents me from doing so. Perhaps the Columbia Spectator could shed some light on Fair Alma’s possible invitation of waterborne death and destruction?
Well: this Spec news article says that the State Supreme Court dismissed a Nick Sprayregen environmental impact (as in, earthquake and hurricane)-related lawsuit as “specious:”
“That Petitioners disagree with the findings of the City is not a basis to invalidate the FEIS [Final Environmental Impact Statement],” the decision states.
This tells us that the geophysicists who sit on New York’s Supreme Court see no major breach of the state’s Land Use Review Process–at least as far as the FEIS is concerned. There’s painfully little in this article about just how the court reached its decision; specifically, there’s nothing about why they think the FEIS gave due attention to the “bathtub’s” apparent ecological vulnerability.
Which brings me to one of the several parts of the Voice piece that doesn’t beg for a snarky de-bunking, unlike that bit about drowning engineering students:
Mueser recommended further studies of the flood hazard and agreed with Jacob’s demand to hire an independent risk-assessment firm—but no firm was named. A floodgate of the type Jacob recommends is mentioned as a possibility. The report also points out that many underground structures already exist in Lower Manhattan and ultimately concludes that the engineering concerns can be resolved, and that therefore the project shouldn’t be prevented from going forward.
Remember the bit from that Spec article where Sprayregen chides Columbia for “failing to take an independent look” at the flooding issue? Sprayregen isn’t the most neutral Manhattanville observer, but it looks like he might have been on to something. There’s much to suggest that Columbia has done a certain legal diligence to the land review process. But there’s less to suggest that it’s taken a close look at the kind of perfectly non-paranoid scenarios that Dr. Jacob envisions–because even if the “bathtub” doesn’t turn into a watery grave, there’s no telling how much it’ll cost to reterofit the place with the floodwall, when and if the City or University decides that hurricanes pose enough of a threat to some of Manhattan’s low-lying areas.
Expect an expert follow-up on this in the next couple of days, now that I’m officially fascinated…