From Boston to Miami cities are being forced to change the way they plan as coastal regions become less desirable as places to build long term.
Sea-level rise maps are turning up everywhere online to show people where the projected sea level rises will impact in the coming years. Only the truly foolish will rely on governments controlled by big business and political blocs to save their properties. The city of Boston has a web page that shows what colleges, hotels and high rises will be engulfed even as it begins building inward in formerly undesirable areas. What has changed?…the climate, that's what!
If there's anything more complicated than the global forces of thermal expansion, ice sheet melt and ocean circulation that contribute to worldwide sea-level rise, it might be the forces of real estate speculation and the race-based historical housing patterns that color present-day gentrification in Miami.
One of the great ironies of those historic housing patterns in Miami is that for decades under Jim Crow, laws and zoning restricted black people to parts of the urban core, an older part of the community that sits on relatively higher ground along a limestone ridge that runs like a topographic stripe down the eastern coast of South Florida. Now, many of those neighborhoods, formerly redlined by lenders and in some places bound in by a literal color wall, have an amenity not yet in the real estate listings: They're on higher ground and are less likely to flood as seas rise.So the historic racism of the city of Miami has caused its poorest citizens to have the most desirable properties much similar to Boston’s Mattapan, Roxbury, Jamaica Plain and Dorchester areas have become the communities of choice for new developers!
Cities and urban areas across the nation are facing a strong adaptation imperatives as traditionally it was homes nearest the shores that brought the most value now it is homes built on strong rocky foundations ie regions of Rocks and Berries. like Boston’s Roxbury community was so descriptively named for. The extent of future climate change depends on a number of variables including the pace of greenhouse gas emissions, deforestation rates, and the response of ecosystems to the changing climate. Alarmingly, since 1990, global emissions of greenhouse gases have increased by 45%, and by 30% since 2000 so it is obvious despite then promises of government it is far from a sure bet any real changes in the opposite direction will occur. What has been revealed is that the primary villains in this attack on the planet are mainly 100 companies whose identities until recently were protected surprisingly by the United nations!
If these companies are allowed to continue to extract fossil fuels at the rate they have been doing over the past 28 years, it is estimated that the global average temperature will rise by up to 4°C, which will result in the certain extinction of a multitude of species and threaten world food production in short many people will die. Surprisingly the major impact of starvation will be seen first not in the third world but Europe that relies almost wholly on imports for the bulk of its food. Imports that will not be forthcoming once supply chains are disrupted and agrarian based countries like China begin competing for the same products instead of exporting!
On the upside, a few large corporations are supporting the transition to a carbon-free economy and have committed to obtaining energy of 100% renewable origin. This change is being led by mainly tech companies that includes: Sol Green, Apple, SHYFT, Facebook, Volt Energy, Google, LG Chem, and Ikea.
Here are the worst U.S. metropolitan areas for flooding and the percent of houses expected to be lost in the next 100-years!
1. Fort Myers, FL, Area
Punta Gorda, FL: 53%
Naples, FL: 49%
Fort Myers, FL: 47%
2. Coastal Georgia
Brunswick, GA: 50%
Savannah, GA: 28%
Hinesville, GA: 20%
3. Coastal Louisiana
Baton Rouge, LA: 30%
Hammond, LA: 27%
Lake Charles, LA: 22%
Lafayette, LA: 16%
4.Coastal Mississippi
Gulfport-Biloxi-Pascagoula, MS: 29%
5. Florida Panhandle
Panama City, FL: 28%
Crestview, FL: 18%
6. Tampa, FL, Area
Tampa, FL: 28%
Homosassa Springs, FL: 20%
Sarasota, FL: 12%
7. San Joaquin Valley, CA
Merced, CA: 21%
Porterville, CA: 12%
8. Coastal North Carolina
New Bern, NC: 20%
Wilmington, NC: 15%
9. Southern Atlantic Florida
Miami, FL: 20%
Vero Beach, FL: 18%
Port St. Lucie, FL: 14%
10. Chesapeake Bay Peninsula
Salisbury, MD/DE: 20%
11. Alabama Coast
Daphne-Fairhope-Foley, AL: 20%
12. Inland Louisiana
Monroe, LA: 18%
Shreveport, LA: 13%
13. Cape Cod, MA
Barnstable Town, MA: 18%
14. Central Texas
Abilene, TX: 17%
Odessa, TX: 12%
15. Orlando, FL, Area
Deltona, FL: 16%
Orlando, FL: 15%
Jacksonville, FL: 14%
The Villages, FL: 14%
Titusville, FL: 13%
16. Virginia Beach Area
Virginia Beach-Norfolk-Newport News, VA-NC: 12%
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