My Response on New York Times Article

In this blog I will be responding to an article that I read in The New York Times “New York is lagging as seas and risks rise, critics warn” by Mireya Navaro and which was published in September 10, 2012. This article first tells the readers how far behind New York is to armor itself from the climate change; secondly what New York can do to improve itself from the upcoming floods; and lastly the high expenses to make New York a climate proof city. When this article was published Hurricane Sandy did not happen yet so she refers back to Hurricane Irene and how the city shut down the subway system and ordered the evacuation of 370,000 people as Hurricane Irene barreled up the Atlantic coast. Hurricane Irene weakened to a tropical storm so it really did not hit New York City so there was no subway shut down or evacuation for Hurricane Irene. But Hurricane Sandy hit New York City hard, there was a subway shut down leaving New Yorkers no way to transport, there was evacuation and there was no power in some parts of the city not to mention the flood in some places around the city. If New York took actions after Hurricane Irene we would have been ready for Hurricane Sandy and many more to come. New York planers suggested that new constructions and buildings should be developed risk free for the upcoming climate disasters but no such actions are imposed. A research group from stuny brook suggested in 2004 of installing movable barriers during hurricanes would block huge tides from entering the city, it wasn’t installed because the cost of installing such barriers could reach nearly $10 billion. There were such excuses like how these barriers could interfere with water ecosystems. Author tells us that five years ago 3 ½ inches of rain stopped the subway system for hours leaving 2.5 million riders no way in or out of the city. Improving our subway the transit agency spent about $34 million. My question is why do we wait till the disaster and spend our money fixing, why don’t we just build it climate appropriately in the first place. It’s interesting how politics plays a role in the readers mind while reading this article about climate change. Out of the top three comments, two readers took this article towards politics and how the republic party does not support climate change and democratic does.