Hoboken Residents Flood DEP With Criticism Of Water Management Plan

Hoboken, NJ – Hoboken city officials are moving forward with a flood control initiative for the municipality… but what do the Mile Square City’s residents think of the effort?

The plan – known as “Resist, Delay, Store, Discharge: a Comprehensive Urban Water Strategy” – includes an assortment of water barriers, green infrastructure and improvements to the municipal stormwater management system.

• See related article: Great (Flood) Wall Of Hoboken: 5 Things You Need To Know

There are five proposed configurations of the plan – designated with letters ranging from A to E - each with their own quirks and potential drawbacks, including proposed flood walls and barriers that may reach up to 12-feet high or more.

Preliminary renderings of the five concepts and their proposed locations can be seen online here.

PUBLIC FEEDBACK

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection recently shared a summary of more than 250 public comments it received in response to the $230 million, federally-funded plan to attack flood problems in the city.

A summary of their comments can be seen here.

Some of the comments included:

• “Options A - E have been presented as concepts and concepts that have not been thought through as to their long term impact on Hoboken. Building permanent walls is an extreme measure to combat a once in a one hundred year event and we implore you to explore other more creative and less drastic options.”
• “Building a wall down a street is a ridiculous solution in today’s modern era. Are you trying to put us back to the stone age with this idea? Dig up the streets that are the lowest area and that get water the most water. Put in a separate large 48” pipe in these streets that is connected to a separate pumping station to move the water someplace else. Blocking water is primitive and who ever came up with that idea should not be working in this sector.”
• “If you build this wall you will destroy the beauty of our neighborhoods and you will negatively impact property values... Harborside Lofts and the Hudson Tea Building have many first floor residences that you will directly impact in a negative way.”
• “I have sincere concerns over the implications of what is referred to as “concept A,” which includes building a wall along an interior (not along the coastline) street. I do not understand how this solution would not adversely affect the homes on the “exterior” of the wall. Most of them had no previous flood issues and this solution certainly introduces a new level of risk for future flooding where there was none prior. Why cause a new problem to solve the first one?”
• “Driving an 8 foot wall down the center of a residential street will create a ghetto followed by a ghost town, destroying the financial lives of hundreds of people. Property values on Garden Street and affected cross streets will plummet. Adjoining unprotected areas like upper Bloomfield and Hudson at 14th Street will also suffer property value declines. For some, this will be economically ruinous – the value of the property will sink below its mortgage value, causing some to abandon their homes and/or declare bankruptcy. While this plan is considered the “cheapest”, I am sure that if the destruction of property value were factored in, it would be far from cheap.”
• “What is certain to me from the concept D and E is they are going to strip the privilege Hoboken residents have-access to the Hudson River waterfront. The waterfront is part of life of all residents in Hoboken and not just to the residents in Maxwell Place or tea buildings.”

See the full DEP document of public comments here.

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Photo by the NJ DEP