NPR: "What's causing devastating rain storms — and what you can do to stay safe"
by Michael Copley
MICHAEL COPLEY: Here's Gernot Wagner. He's a climate economist at Columbia Business School.
GERNOT WAGNER: It seems to be bad right now. This is the best year of our lifetimes.
COPLEY: Wagner says communities need to invest billions and billions to deal with more extreme weather.
JUANA SUMMERS: OK, billions and billions, but what kinds of investments are we talking about here?
COPLEY: Yeah, we're talking about overhauling stormwater management systems that cities built decades ago so that they can handle more water coming down in these storms. They're also going to have to make big investments in underground rail systems, like the New York subway. There have been cases of passengers stranded and service disrupted in places like Boston, D.C. and London in recent years. Some cities are trying to make investments to make their systems more resilient to climate change, waterproofing stations and tunnels. But keeping water out is a constant battle. And Wagner says some flooding, like we saw last night in the New York subway, is expected.
WAGNER: Yes, certain amount of flooding around the tracks in the subway system is, in fact, by design. Well, more flooding like that and people will die.
COPLEY: Wagner says a lot of these transportation systems are already operating at or near the breaking point.
