Comment by namibj
3 days ago
Yeah you can start by not building _more_ in the flood plain. And if you do, then don't build architecture that is incapable of just accepting the temporarily higher ground water. We know how to basement just make the basement high enough to tower over the flood. Oh, no cheap ground-level storefront windows? Welp, guess those have to be elevated above sufficiently voluminous drainage channels (the former streets).
Or in Florida's case, mandate hurricane ties on timber homes so they can't lift off their slabs.
One of the things that annoys me most about non-engineering mindsets is not looking at problems from a multivariate optimization perspective.
There are problems, and then there are always more variables to be balanced to optimally solve them than people expect.
The critical additional ones, more often than not: time and money.
> Or in Florida's case, mandate hurricane ties on timber homes so they can't lift off their slabs.
That doesn't mitigate much. The mass of a paper and matchsticks "house" just isn't enough to resist it getting torn apart - if not by the wind, then by debris.
The only kind of structure able to survive a dead-on hit is steel bar reinforced concrete or very, very solidly built brick-and-mortar. But that is expensive to build.
> The only kind of structure able to survive a dead-on hit...
That isn't the goal, because the eyewall of a Cat 5 is minuscule in footprint compared to the surrounding wind bands.
Consequently, most houses are going to have to deal with those winds, for which timber bolted to slab + properly secured to roof is perfectly valid.
It's uneconomical to hurricane-proof all housing in Florida.
It's entirely possible (and has largely been done) to mitigate the bulk of hurricane wind impact (the lesser standard) for all housing in Florida.
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Explain to the class where the water is gonna get all that momentum from. Florida is flat.
The storm surge goes up (and a whole bunch of water falls on top of it). The storm surge goes down. This isn't some river bursting it's banks.
Between the requirements imposed by needing to resist hurricane winds and the slab ties it's "good enough" that there's a 99.9999% chance the building will stay on it's foundation long enough for something else to be the problem.
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If people are going to build cheap houses, it makes sense to spend a little bit more on adding the hurricane ties (it's not like they're expensive or difficult to use). It might not be perfect, but it's surely better than just relying on gravity.
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