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Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

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Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#91
post #49
post #4

I can only assume it will go higher. We need to push FEMA to have a 2 and done rule. After that the property must be returned back to dunes/parks/public spaces.

Yes, 1000x this. It is frustrating to be sending piles of money to these states every year, which they then waste on political stunts like flying legal immigrants to other states, instead of taking care of their citizens, or maybe investing in climate hardening. And then they're completely unprepared for cold weather, hot weather, wet weather, dry weather, ... and say things like "Nobody knew ___ could be so complica…

Florida is pretty low on federally funding dependency ranking.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#92
post #4

I can only assume it will go higher. We need to push FEMA to have a 2 and done rule. After that the property must be returned back to dunes/parks/public spaces.

Same for San Francisco. Two earthquakes and it must be returned back to the swamp. New York got hit bad with Sandy. Thirty years or so and we might level it too. It turns out that with climate change, nothing is going to be safe. And with the pacific shelf, we will always have that as an issue too.

One of the reasons SF is so expensive is the building codes. After the 89 earthquake somethings were not rebuilt. When the local Government allow homes to be built with lax standards simply because they want them to be cheap I agree they do not deserve to be rebuilt on the tax payers dime. Might also make the Condo safer.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#93
post #4

I can only assume it will go higher. We need to push FEMA to have a 2 and done rule. After that the property must be returned back to dunes/parks/public spaces.

Yes, this makes such good sense to me.

In Europe, rivers are often surrounded by parkland on either side as they flow through cities, such as the Elbe in Dresden. It's gorgeous public space, which benefits everyone, but it also is there for another reason -- the river floods fairly regularly, and so by leaving that as uninhabited park space the floods can happen without causing too much damage.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#94
ITT: People who don't understand economic loss vs damage.

Economic loss means anything not transacting is counted.

Disney, Universal, Sea World closed for a few days? "economic loss"

Joes house on the beach: "damage"

I don't have access to the article, but I imagine half of this amount is just the first category, since Florida is a tourism state.

That being said the government should stop covering beach front property, either get private insurance at a fair price or don't build at all.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#95
post #4

I can only assume it will go higher. We need to push FEMA to have a 2 and done rule. After that the property must be returned back to dunes/parks/public spaces.

I was looking to move to Fort Myers or Fort Myers Shores with my girlfriend (she’s originally from there), and we looked at five different houses. Based on damage maps/satellite photos/Facebook posts all five of those houses were flooded. But, the problem is only two of them were in any sort of flood zones. The only reason we didn’t buy is because it looked like the market was tanking. I think there is a lot of blaming going on here against homeowners who really didn’t know better. FEMA really needs to update their maps to account for more catastrophic storms like this. It’s also important to keep in mind this storm could have been a lot worse. It was “only” a Category 4.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Miami has the sturdiest residential construction materials of any city I have lived in. Cinderblock is extremely common. It still doesn't save your home if you build at 5ft above sea level and a hurricane brings 15ft of storm surge.

All new construction in Sanibel, FL (which got hit hard by Ian) is required to have one floor of "sacrificial space" above which finished living structure can be built. In most homes this is a garage or above-ground storage room with no drywall, and all electrical connections at least several feet off the floor. This doesn't make storm surge cost-free and we have yet to see whether it was enough for Ian, but I doubt…

it was 8-9ft in that area I think

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#97
post #4

I can only assume it will go higher. We need to push FEMA to have a 2 and done rule. After that the property must be returned back to dunes/parks/public spaces.

Same for San Francisco. Two earthquakes and it must be returned back to the swamp. New York got hit bad with Sandy. Thirty years or so and we might level it too. It turns out that with climate change, nothing is going to be safe. And with the pacific shelf, we will always have that as an issue too.

That goes for severe blizzards for NYC as well, because I say so.

Public funds must no longer be allocated to clearing snow from roads every year just because selfish people decide to live in NYC.

Re: Hurricane Ian damages in Southeast estimated at $100B to $120B

#100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hurricanes are a fact of life in the gulf and southeastern atlantic coasts. There is no area that has not have been hit twice already in the past century. So all this coastline should be dunes and park spaces?

Public funds should not pay to rebuild the same property more than 1-2 times within N years. You either: a) Build the property to withstand all but 1-2 statistically expected hurricanes within that N year period. This is possible, it's just costly. b) You don't get public funds c) You get private insurance d) You don't build

I lived on a US military base that regularly received typhoons. Damage never exceeded $5 million, and was typically much lower.

Much of the housing was built in the 50s. It was definitely low quality, including such issues as bad electrical grounding and about as many cockroaches there are stars above. At least, that's how I felt as a kid, anyways.

But, it was made of concrete and had steel storm doors. The biggest issue for us was flooding (we were at the bottom of a hill) but newer structures tended to be on stilts or have a sacrificial first floor. This was true both on and off base.

Rents off base apparently are pretty cheap by US standards. And this is with a climate akin to that of Hawaii with beaches nearby.

So it's possible to build well and be cheap.

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