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New York is building a wall to hold back the ocean

Vox | August 3, 2025



Climate change is leading to increasingly violent storms. Can seawalls hold back floods?

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Staten Island recently received funding for a nearly 5-mile-long seawall to protect its coast. But the plan raises a lot of questions. We’re living in a dangerously dynamic world: Hurricanes are getting worse, wildfires are rampant in California, extreme heat is melting roads in India, and sea levels continue to rise. Will a wall really be enough to protect our coastal cities?

Alissa Walker from Curbed talked to us about how it’s too late to stop the changing climate, but not too late to change how we think about infrastructure.

Check out some further reading from our sister site, Curbed.com:

https://www.curbed.com/2017/2/15/14616928/trump-nasa-climate-change-california
https://ny.curbed.com/2019/4/25/18515213/staten-island-usace-seawall-climate-change-photo-essay

For more research and climate-related content:
https://www.c2es.org/content/hurricanes-and-climate-change/
https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-japan-disaster-seawalls/seven-years-after-tsunami-japanese-live-uneasily-with-seawalls-idUSKCN1GL0DK

And for more on seawalls:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/after-a-14-billion-upgrade-new-orleans-levees-are-sinking/
https://news.mongabay.com/2018/06/on-indias-kerala-coast-a-man-made-solution-exacerbates-a-natural-problem/

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Comments

This post currently has 36 comments.

  7. @AMI12349

    August 3, 2025 at 10:20 am

    I think this is a great idea! I lived in Staten Island in 1996…was my first rental place in New York. Will never forget taking the ferry to Manhattan every day. After growing up in Georgia, it felt a lot more homelike than the rest of New York City. Was so sad to hear what happened to the area under Hurricane Sandy, and am happy now they are trying this solution. As for getting the Dutch, as suggested in some other comments…that's a great idea. You know, the original name of New York was New Amsterdam…they used to be a Dutch colony…so you would think the government authorities would have picked up the expertise of the Dutch in engineering for sea protection!

  9. @M.a.s.i.n.u

    August 3, 2025 at 10:20 am

    This may be expensive, but I think that building a wall from New Jersey to Long Island is the best option, building a swing door would allow it to be closed when there is a storm. But I'm not done, I'd also build a toad over it allowing another connection to NY, which would allow trade to run smoother and also reduce traffic, tolls would fund part of the cost. Just think about it how many billions have been spent every time there has been a storm? Should we continue to risk lives and spend billions in the future?

  13. @talljohn5350

    August 3, 2025 at 10:20 am

    Hey how about with all the taxes taken from us you give us proper storm drains. The city forces us to put all rain water into the ground and no one has enough property to be able to handle that much water causing all kinds of basement issues. Not to mention all the flooding that happens on the street because of the embarrassment of a sewer system that we have.

  14. @Entierrando

    August 3, 2025 at 10:20 am

    In the last week I heard the US would train teachers to use guns because they don't want to ban them and I thought "Such a ridiculous country". Then I watched a video in which I knew that the same country has 8 parking spots per vehicle, having more area for parking cars than for houses, instead of having a good public transport policy, and the same thought came again to my mind. Now I listen to this, already knowing that the US is one of the main GHG emitters in the entire world, and remembering that Trump withdrew from the Paris Agreement, and I get more and more convinced that it is A RIDICULOUS COUNTRY INDEED.

  25. @jglammi

    August 3, 2025 at 10:20 am

    There is NO evidence of increasingly intense storms.
    Temperature has risen only 1.5 F in the last 200 years.
    Forest fires are way, way down.

Comments are closed.

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