Supervisor Hyland to Address Residents About Flooding
A public meeting Thursday will focus on a 2012 Army Corps of Engineers flood reduction study.
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Mount Vernon District Supervisor Gerry Hyland will host a public meeting to discuss a flood reduction study Thursday evening.
The meeting will review the flood reduction study completed by the Army Corps of Engineers in 2012. The meeting is intended to start a discussion about the flood wall in this area and where the best location would be for this proposed flood wall.
The Belle Haven watershed contains the Belle View and New Alexandria communities; both experienced severe flooding from storm surges during Hurricane Isabel in 2003. Most of the subdivisions lie within the 100-year floodplain and may be susceptible to future flooding. More than 200 homes were damaged by flooding during Hurricane Isabel.
A $30 million bond referendum is on the November ballot to fund projects to protect the Lower Huntington neighborhood.
The meeting will be Thursday at 7 p.m. in Room 221 at the South County Government Center.
For more information, call the Fairfax County Stormwater Management staff at 703-324-5500.
Keep up with flood-related news and much more from crime to real estate to community events with the Huntington-Belle Haven Patch newsletter. Learn more here!
Scott
12:55 pm on Monday, October 22, 2012
You can't fight Mother Nature. Go with the flow. Time to give up and relocate the people like Grudy.
Steven Larsen
12:55 pm on Monday, October 22, 2012
The New Alexandria/Belle View neighborhood is a thriving community with 200+ homes, 980 condos, 3 residential towers and a thriving mall stretching from Fort Hunt Road to the GW Parkway. Real estate values exceed $500 million. As the Potomac River rose an additional 6.5’ during Isabelle’s storm surge in ’03 our homes, condos and businesses filled with as much as 5’ of water. Many lived without utilities for weeks or months until cleanup & repairs could be completed. Among other tidal and fluvial events we’ve come within inches of flooding in ’96 (Floyd) and in ’11 (Lee.) Prior to construction of the late 1980s levee/pumping station, portions of the neighborhood flooded regularly. We need this project to go forward.
The simplest & most comprehensive alignment presented in these studies will give our community the best chance to obtain Federal funding for the project. Less than $15 million is a small price to pay to avoid future disasters. Exclusion from the protection area will drive costs up dramatically. Compromises will have to be made. A longer walk to the bus stop/bike trail. Altered views near levees and walls will affect a small percentage of residents. Some loss of large tree cover will be expected near the project; however, a well-designed landscape of smaller trees and shrubs would have an equal or greater appeal. The wall design will undoubtedly be in step with National Park Service aesthetics. In the end, the payback will be enormous.
Barbara Elkin
9:03 am on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
It is very troubling that many of the residents of New Alexandria who live closest to where the proposed flood wall would go, and whose property would be affected by the loss of trees and the location of a high wall in front of or near their homes, were not notified by the County of this meeting and only found out about it accidentally during the past few days. The County should delay the meeting and then send out a formal notice to everyone in New Alexandria, with background information that can be reviewed prior to the rescheduled meeting. It is essential that everyone who is affected be invited into the process, not just selected individuals. This will make it more likely that a true consensus could develop.
monkeyrotica
9:03 am on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Or you could, y'know, move. Instead you knowingly live in a flood plain and now you're complaining about flooding? How is this different from people moving next to an airport and complaining about the noise? And you want to stick everyone ELSE with the bill? Sounds like communism to me.
Janice Rivera
1:01 pm on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
More effort needs to be put into researching the viability of updating the neighborhood's current pumping station and flood control system before time, money and energy are focused on an obtrusive, destructive and grossly unattractive concrete flood wall to be deemed the solution to protecting our beautiful surroundings and real estate.
Steven Larsen
2:25 pm on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
@Janice. There is a lot of misinformation out there about our current level of protection.. Our current levee, flood gate and pumping station is designed to protect our community to 8' above seal level. It has performed as designed for that elevation. Hurricane Isabelle rose to 9.6' ASL or 19 inches higher than the "lip of the bowl." No upgrades to our currect protection system would have protected us from Isabelle or any flood higher than 8' ASL. And yes unattractive walls are unacceptable.
Blaise P. Pugh
9:52 pm on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
We really
Blaise P. Pugh
9:52 pm on Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Barbara Elkin, The stream between 11th Street, and Woodhaven Road is the divider of the subdivisions. New Alexandria to the West, and the community of Riverview to the East. NACA (New Alexandria Citizens Association) sends a newsletter out monthly to all residents of New Alexandria. This month there was attachment to the newsletter concerning the upcoming meeting. Are you sure you actually live in New Alexandria. If you do, call your block captain and ask them for the newsletter for and announcement. If you do not know who your block captain is, you probably live in Riverview.
t, you live in Riverview, and if you did not get a notice from NACA,(New Alexandria Citizens Association) that is probably why.