Is it time to start moving our coastal cities inland?

[ChisolmTrailDem]

10. Bring in engineers from The Netherlands and put people to work...

...building sea barriers and gates.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/10/30/dutch_flood_control_lessons_for_new_york_city.html

Ongoing climate change is both going to make severe storms like Hurricane Sandy more common and also raise baseline sea levels and increase general risk of coastal flooding. We're seeing today that even when loss of life is fairly minimal, the indirect economic damage of flooding a major urban area can be severe—power will be out in New York for days, and nobody really knows when the Subway will be back up and running. Unless the city can reasonably safeguard itself against flood, the consequences are going to be disastrous. We can—and should—hope for global action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions but it's extraordinarily unlikely that as much will be done fast enough to prevent the need for substantial adaptation measures. That's particularly true for a densely populated wealthy area like Greater New York City where even fantastically costly investments pay off if they're needed to avoid rendering the massive amount of fixed infrastructure already in play useless.

The best place to look for guidance is probably the city's former colonial overlords in the Netherlands who've been trying for a while now to market their flood control expertise through their Holland Trade website:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2012/10/30/dutch_flood_control_lessons_for_new_york_city.html