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#Post#: 2020--------------------------------------------------
What happens if Erie Canal Embankments are NOT cleared,
inspected & maintained?
DIR By: Doug K
Date: February 27, 2022, 10:26 am
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While a small segment of the Monroe County population (who lives
near or walks along the NYS Canal System) is debating whether
Erie Canal Embankments are actually "unsafe dams", there are
thousands of Monroe County residents who are still living under
the threat of what the NYS Canal Corporation has termed "unsafe
earthen embankments".
In fact, the NYS Canal folks have dedicated an entire website to
this canal safety cause -
HTML https://www.nyscanalintegrity.org/
And many of those county residents are Canal Neighbors, who
still wonder what they need to do about insuring their safety,
and the safety of their home & families, including whether to
buy FLOOD INSURANCE as an extra layer of protection.
So we dusted off this old FEMA Flood Insurance Forum Board to
open up that Flood Insurance discussion once again... because
there are still some in our community that are fighting against
Erie Canal Embankment Maintenance & Safety Efforts.
And our advice to any Erie Canal Neighbor will always be the
same... If you are worried about the leaky, tree-covered,
uninspected, unsafe Earthen Erie Canal Embankment in your
"backyard", buy Flood Insurance NOW, while it is not "mandatory"
for your location, Village or Town.
If you are NOT in a Flood Zone, and call your local agent about
Flood Insurance, the cost will be about equal to your current
Home Owners Insurance cost, for that Flood Insurance Policy
addition... and you will have peace of mind, just in case the
Erie Canal decides to wash away your home.
It's a known fact that when FEMA changes it's Flood Hazard
Mapping, making any area fall into a new Flood Zone Rating of A
or anything starting with an A, the rates on a Flood Insurance
policy can go up as much as 3X - 5X the cost of that base
homeowners policy.
And the only place that people can purchase said insurance AFTER
maps change, is the FEMA based NFIP organization... National
Flood Insurance Program
MORE INFORMATION ON FEMA MAPPING
While some local canal walkers on social media were saying there
is "nothing wrong" with Erie Canal Embankments, the NYS Canal
Corporation, under the watchful eye of their new parent, New
York Power Authority (NYPA), was BUSY having their entire Canal
System inspected, videos of the entire Erie Canal Trail were
made (similar to Google Maps) and Canal Engineers were on the
ground assessing overall Canal System safety, including
embankments, sluices, and trails.
The result was several updates to their Embankment Integrity
SEQR documents, including to ALL of the FEMA Flood Hazard
Mapping in Monroe County.
Here's the blurb that showed up one day on the NYS Canal
Embankment Integrity Technical Documents page
[attachimg=1]
HTML https://www.canals.ny.gov/Earthen_Embankment/counties/county.html
To show the changes we have selected the Towns of Pittsford &
Perinton FEMA Flood Maps that have been recently updated by
NYPA. It's just to show how simple it is to update a Flood Zone
Map, that could cost you as a homeowner THOUSANDS of DOLLARS in
extra "required insurance" that may not have been there when you
bought the home.
Here's the current FEMA Flood Map last updated in 2008, note the
size of the area shaded as Flood Zone
[attachimg=2]
HTML https://msc.fema.gov/portal/search?#searchresultsanchor
And here's an updated version, which has expanded that Flood
Zone quite a bit, and now made most of it based on the
"elevation" of the property/structure. That is what the Flood
Zone - AE stands for. So depending on if you have a home that is
ground level, or raised up 3-4 feet with a foundation and steps,
your cost for Flood insurance will be based on the "expected"
depth of the water during a flood event.
That base elevation has not been stated on this map, but with
the Erie Canal at 463' above sea level in these two Towns, and
much of the property at 400-420', it's not hard to imagine that
the flood elevation may require that three to four feet. And
basements will still be flooded...
[attachimg=3]
HTML https://www.canals.ny.gov/Earthen_Embankment/municipalities/Monroe/Town_of_Pittsford.html
WHY UNMAINTAINED EARTHEN EMBANKMENTS MATTER
So, the REAL question is what if FEMA were to look at the new
NYS Canal Corporation Earthen Embankment website that now shows
where the Earthen Embankments are located in Pittsford &
Perinton?
If FEMA went to look at those canal embankments they would see
that they are NOT up to NYS Code, and also not up to FEDERAL
code.
If FEMA looked for records of past safety inspection records,
they wouldn't find very many, if there are any at all... they
would see that many have had no inspections at all.
FEMA would find a 2015 report from the NYS Comptroller office
stating the Canal System was in dire shape, needing immediate
repair. And another 2018 NYS Report that showed Dam Safety in NY
was being ignored, and had to be remedied...for the safety of
the public in and around these water-impounding structures.
FEMA would also find about 400 pages of a NYS SEQR Environmental
Report that says the Erie Canal is an accident waiting to
happen... and the result is a devastating flood, loss of life &
property and an environmental disaster that will take "years to
recover from" according to that State Environmental Quality
Review, recently filed by NYPA on behalf of the Canal Integrity
Program.
FEMA would also probably find that many Canal homeowners did
NOT have flood insurance, because some in the local population
ignored the dire warnings from the NYS Canal System owners.
Those people were influenced by social media and formed a group
that tried to turn Canal Embankment Safety into a "cause to save
the environment".
The question is simple....
Do you think that FEMA will IGNORE the fact that the majority of
two Towns in New York State, Pittsford & Perinton, are under the
threat of flood water from EIGHT high hazard embankments along
10 - 12 miles of the Erie Canal?
That flood water is approximately 46 MILLION GALLONS of water
per mile, based on the size of the Erie Canal "prism", 500
million gallons TOTAL
HTML https://www.easycalculation.com/area/volume-of-trapezoidal-prism.php
[attachimg=4]
HTML https://canals.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=42703bd1c0504a14933d2010ce739043
What happen when FEMA sees MAPS that show the NYS Canal
Corporation and PUBLIC UTILITY PROVIDER, New York Power, own
miles & miles of UNSAFE EARTHEN DAMS?
That's the big question, and one that those who walk along the
Erie Canal Trail, who are opposing the removal of "trees",
really don't care about...
Because it doesn't come out of their pocket
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