Rising Waters Are Drowning Amtrak's Northeast Corridor

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-amtrak-sea-level/

by koops • 8 years ago

211 176 8 years ago

koops6• 8 years ago

The US east coast has post-glacial rebound and Atlantic meridional overturning circulation slowdown to compound their sea-level problems. But most the rise is nothing special compared the rest of the world, which is the worst part of this.

jackcarter2• 8 years ago

Won't post-glacial rebound counteract rising sea levels?

koops6• 8 years ago

Unfortunately no, not here. The metaphor I've heard is continent as couch cushion: the glacier was "sitting" on the upper part of North America, pushing up the edges. Now that weight is gone, the coasts are dropping slightly.

jcranmer2• 8 years ago

It depends on where you are. If you were underneath the ice sheet (which is Long Island and further north), then you are rebounding since the ice was pushing down on you. If you were further south, then you are slowly sinking due to the rebalancing of weight.

njarboe3• 8 years ago

Calculating what the sea level rise will be if certain amount of ice melts is quite complicated because of gravitational attraction due to the large mass of the ice, changes in ocean circulation due to the temperature and saltfree content of ice meltwaters, change in the earths axis of rotation due to ice melt, change in ocean currents, etc.

When part of the Greenland ice sheet melts the global mean sea level rises, but it is likely to cause sea level drops in some places around the northern Atlantic. How and where is going to be almost impossible to model and we will just have to wait and see how it plays out. Journal articles here [1,2]

[1] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10584-010-9935-... [2] https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/201...

mikejulietbravo2• 8 years ago

As a very frequent Amtrak rider, I’m pretty conflicted here. On one hand, climate change is bad. On the other hand, giving the Amtrak fleet a bath, or altogether destroying it sounds pretty good to me.

pavel_lishin2• 8 years ago

On the other hand, giving the Amtrak fleet a bath, or altogether destroying it sounds pretty good to me.

Why?

ams61102• 8 years ago

Amtrak is hands-down the worst passenger rail service I've ever used, out of services in four different countries. I will say I've never used Amtrak in the Northeast which I understand is somewhat better than the rest of the country, but that's not saying much.

rayiner5• 8 years ago

I commuted on Amtrak for two years between DC and Baltimore. The train was routinely 15 minutes late, and regularly 1 hour+. Destroying it might allow something else to be built in its place.

mikejulietbravo2• 8 years ago

It was mostly a joke, I ride the Amtrak multiple times per month. It's pretty awful. Unless you're taking the Acela you need to budget 2+ hours for the inevitable delays.

On the NE Regional, I'm delayed 1/3 trips at least.

hprotagonist• 8 years ago

Even a decade ago, some long stretches through connecticut reminded me a lot of the tramway sequence in Spirited Away: https://vimeo.com/91985775

arethuza• 8 years ago

The train I get along the Fife coast on the way into Edinburgh is so close to the sea I often find myself wondering if you could jump from the train into the sea...

abstractbeliefs• 8 years ago

Probably could between Aberdour and Burntisland, as you pass silver sands

peterhj• 8 years ago

In the Bay Area today, a section of Amtrak's Capital Corridor passes through the salt ponds and the Baylands marshes which is also quite reminiscent.

mistrial9• 8 years ago

the California reference document on this topic might be .. a 71 page April 2017 pdf .. "Rising Seas in California -- an Update on Sea-Level Rise Science" through California OPC_SAT

jonas21• 8 years ago

The report’s authors estimated the initial cost of protecting the study area to be $78 million, based on the premise that water levels around Wilmington would rise 2 feet by 2050.

That's a drop in the bucket compared to Amtrak's $38 billion maintenance backlog or the $13 billion Hudson tunnel project.

Out of all the potential effects of climate change, this seems like one of the least worrisome -- we even know how to fix it already!

koops6• 8 years ago

The $78 million is for ten miles of the 457-mile corridor for the sea-level rise estimated for 2050. And the rise will only accelerate after 2050.

But yes, that does seem like a low figure.

cabaalis• 8 years ago

based on the premise that water levels around Wilmington would rise 2 feet by 2050.

I'm curious. I've been hearing about the expected effects of climate change for many years. At least since ~2005 or 2006. Are there any predictions of conditions in 2000, or 2020, which have panned out as predicted?

koops6• 8 years ago

I don't know about sea level rise prediction accuracy, but temperature "hindcasts" hold up pretty well:

https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-how-well-have-climate-m...

Retric• 8 years ago

Sea level rises is currently only 8cm in the last 20 years, but it has happened. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise#/media/File%3...

PS: It’s all’s up 18 cm from 1897 but recent rise has been much more obvious.

300bps• 8 years ago

My favorite article on this topic was from The Independent in 2000 that stated snowfalls in England were a thing of the past and children would not know what snow is within a few years.

The Independent finally deleted the article but here’s a summary of it:

http://www.globalwarming.org/2010/12/27/headline-2000-snowfa...

freehunter• 8 years ago

this seems like one of the least worrisome -- we even know how to fix it already!

The biggest struggle with climate change (in the US at least) is trying to convince businesses that they're going to be impacted financially. If anything we need more industry-specific reporting to try to show companies how ignoring climate change will impact their bottom line.

mortivore• 8 years ago

I don't think it matters if you show businesses that climate will impact them financially. The people running the show may not be running it when the financial burden actually comes around.

If there is no impact or very little for the person/people currently running the business, then there is no reason to make a move to prevent/mitigate the problem.

munk-a2• 8 years ago

Amtrak is weirdly a company that will suffer from climate change and could actually start addressing it (they end up shipping the vast majority of coal and could at least tax the movement of that good to recoup this expense) but most companies that will be hit by the effects of climate change won't be significantly contributing to it.

Industries that see ever more profit in fields with high externalities won't have direct a motivation to address those externalities even if they're aware of them - assuming they're unaware in any way.

(aside, coal isn't actually that terrible in terms of contribution to climate change, but reliance on it is definitely contributing, there may be bigger fish but this one has a good bit of meat on it)

chiefalchemist2• 8 years ago

"convince businesses that they're going to be impacted financially"

Yes and no. My take is this: there's too much time and energy being put into why and who does or doesn't believe (it's human-made), and not enough focus is on "solutions" (to the higher waters). Often this distraction seems to be generated by politicians.

I wish I had $10 for every time I've seen an article misuse the phrase "climate-change deniers" My sense those people are very few. That is, flat out deniers are few. Most everyone else sees it coming. The debate is why it's happening (human vs natural).

Even if we settle on why (which we won't), it seems to me Amtrak, etc. are still going to be impacted. At some point we need to focus on the ends, and let the means go.

Note: I realize that __if__ we settle on human-made there is, at least in theory, opportunity to slow the change. I understand that. My faith breaks down on ever being able to agree on why. It's as if the building is on fire and we're so busy debating why the fire started that we've forgotten we still need to do something about the fire.

Udik3• 8 years ago

The biggest struggle with climate change (in the US at least) is trying to convince businesses that they're going to be impacted financially.

You also need to convince them that any local mitigation action (maintenance, waters management, etc.) will impact them financially more than a global concerted effort to stop co2 emissions. Which seems a very difficult argument to make.

reddog• 8 years ago

If anything we need more industry-specific reporting to try to show companies how ignoring climate change will impact their bottom line.

The life span of the average business is about 10 years. The median employment tenure (years that wage and salary workers had been with their current employer) in 4.2 years. It's awefully tough to get anyone today to care about the bottom line in Q3 2068.

arduanika• 8 years ago

It must be nice to have a mental model where "businesses" is this big fuzzy blob containing all the fat cats at either the giving or receiving end of an externality. Show the moneypants how much it will hurt him! Then the other moneypants will stop ignoring things!

matt_j• 8 years ago

A lot of business will make a lot of money before climate change affects them, and after, when they pivot to take advantage of a population that all of a sudden needs X (sandbags? boats? water purification?).

Change needs to happen at the government level and be imposed on businesses in spite of what they think. It needs to happen at the alliance level (UN) because governments don't want to act against their economic interests unless they have to, even if their economic foresight is short (a presidential term, maximum).

That they (people with short term economic advantage) have succeeded in making climate change an optional belief is the biggest worry of all. Now we have sheeple (half the general population) blindly running to the precipice while loudly proclaiming anyone that can see it coming as stupid/liar/hands in ears/la la la.

lostlogin• 8 years ago

If anything we need more industry-specific reporting to try to show companies how ignoring climate change will impact their bottom line.

It’s going to be a positive thing for many companies. Defences need to be engineered, built and maintained. It isnt bad for everyone.

zachrose2• 8 years ago

I was on a road trip throughout a lot of different parts of America last month. A park ranger in Big Bend told me that a tributary creek of the Rio Grande was a hundred feet wide, when normally you can just jump over it. A lakeside highway rest area in North Carolina was flooded up to a permanently mounted bench and trash can.

amvalo• 8 years ago

Huh? Big bend is nowhere near sea level..

moate2• 8 years ago

Rising temperatures melting glacial/mountain ice more dramatically contributing to river water carry? I'm not saying that's specifically the case, just throwing out a possible hypothesis. Plenty of others exist (bad rainy season, tributary re-routing due to industry, removal of forested areas that would have previously soaked up water, etc).

Could be a global warming thing, could be a seasonal thing, could be anything really.

CodeSheikh2• 8 years ago

Blessing in disguise here for Amtrack and a great opportunity to do an overhaul of a subset of the one of the oldest railroad infrastructure in the USA. Many lessons we can learn from European counterparts.

caymanjim• 8 years ago

It's not easy to move a rail line. It's politically and economically infeasible. Amtrak hugs the coast in the northeast in part because that land is useless for anything else. Much like the subways, bridges, tunnels, roads, and every other piece of transit infrastructure in the northeast, the rail problems are systemic and it's a huge effort just to keep things moving at all. This isn't a blessing; it's a snapshot of one of dozens of problems that are just as urgently in need of investment.

dmckeon• 8 years ago

Amazing how most of the reactions equate “move” to “relocate to a different corridor” without offering the costs of “elevate the trackage in the same corridor”. Not cheap, to be sure, but avoids the land cost/urban planning morass of how to relocate major infrastructure.

While we’re at it, make the elevated passenger trackage be serious high-speed rail, instead of the max. 125mph (~200kph) it is now.

bobthepanda2• 8 years ago

Amtrak's long-term vision did involve moving away from the coast and swinging up future HSR via Hartford and western Massachusetts.

I say "did", because politicians from eastern Connecticut and Rhode Island were understandably not thrilled about losing their existing high-ish speed services.

CodeSheikh2• 8 years ago

"politically and economically" this is the problem right there. When people graciously justify (and subconsciously) roadblock to any advancement and progress economical and political issues.

If Amtrack pauses its service segment-by-segment so they get to focus on re-building infrastructure then I believe It will not have that much of a negative impact on travelers, at least. People can always resort to other traveling alternatives(buses, cars, planes). Heck, it is economical to travel from NYC to DC by bus vs train. Train gets you in 3 hours for $200 and bus gets you in 4 hours for $19. For me, $200 is worth paying if I get to DC in an hour!

Yes there will be job displacements while the overhaul is underway. But for numbers sake, more job will be created as part of the overhaul.

By politics I assume you meant unions. It is a rabbit-hole debate but I will say this that unions have done more damage to the infrastructure progress than any other political entity in northeast USA.

sailfast2• 8 years ago

Water levels around Wilmington would rise 2 feet by 2050. That reflects the median of possible warming scenarios

2 feet is the median!? And things continue to accelerate?

I thought I followed climate change issues but somehow did not know that in most people's lifetimes sea levels will rise multiple feet. I would've thought folks would be more... concerned? The maps of New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut look like they are going to cost us billions to trillions to mitigate between now and 2100.

akiselev• 8 years ago

When people talk about sea level rise, they usually mean the global average sea level, or the change in total amount of liquid water in the ocean. When talking about local sea level rise, they usually mean the change in maximum high tide. Given all the unique coastlines, gravitational/water tides, and temperature differences, an average global sea rise means different things to different regions.

A shallow bay in the tropics that is right in the way of ocean currents, for example, can see an order of magnitude more change in high tide than the global sea level, let alone during surges and swells.

throwaway7312• 8 years ago

I thought I followed climate change issues but somehow did not know that in most people's lifetimes sea levels will rise multiple feet. I would've thought folks would be more... concerned?

According to Sir David King (head U.K. climate scientist) in 2004, all continents other than Antarctica will be uninhabitable by 2100 due to manmade global warming.[1]

I wouldn't be worried about New York. I'd be on the next ship down to Antarctica to go stake my land claim right now before it all gets gobbled up.

I mean, if this manmade global warming stuff is real, and it's as bad as they say it is.

[1] http://web.archive.org/web/20100817023019/http://www.indepen...

superjan• 8 years ago

King is not stating that here. He just says that the earth was no fun place to be, the last time greenhouse gasses were as high as they’ll likely be in 2100.

pdonis3• 8 years ago

King has no basis whatever for his claim that the rest of the globe other than Antarctica was uninhabitable 60 million years ago. There are fossils from this period, including fossils of mammals, from all continents. The global average temperature during the PETM (which I assume is what he is referring to) was about 8 C warmer than today, which is warm but by no means uninhabitable. It's also a lot warmer than the expected warming by 2100.

shagmin• 8 years ago

From my understanding that is likely going to be local to the eastern US seaboard. The gulf stream goes northeast towards Europe, and "pulls" water away from the east coast, effectively making the sea level on the east coast about 6' lower. So the gulf stream just has to lose a little strength to make local sea levels rise drastically, even if globally sea levels are barely rising.

graeme5• 8 years ago

I have no idea why people aren't more concerned. I think the desire to avoid sounding "apocalyptic" has led to people not emphasizing the expected damage if we keep using CO2.

Anyone with a child born this year can expect that child to live past 2100. A future grandchild will live well past 2100. Even most people reading this can probably expect to live past 2050.

It's not an abstract issue that will affect future generations. It will affect us and our direct descendants.

dragonwriter• 8 years ago

Anyone with a child born this year can expect that child to live past 2100.

Overall life expectancy at birth is not greater than 81 in the US, though it is at 81 for females.

stale20024• 8 years ago

Well, that is because things aren't literally apocalyptic.

The science says that sea levels will rise by a meter or so over the next hundred years. That won't end the world.

The science says that climate change will cause trillions of dollars of damages, over the next hundred years.

Trillions of dollars in damages is bad. But it is on the same scale of "badness" as another iraq war.

I'd want to prevent a third Iraq war, but I am not going to pretend that it would put billions of lives in danger.

LiamMcCalloway• 8 years ago

Should we talk about JFK being under water as well? see NY map.

joering2• 8 years ago

Speaking of Amtrack with such fast news cycle, did they find out the cause of two recent crashes (I believe New Jersey /Connecticuit) ? Ine over some oassage-bridge. I cant find anything on it anymore.

calebsurfs• 8 years ago

This is nothing compared to the estimated $3.5 billion to redirect the tracks underground in San Diego. Coastal bluff failures are occurring within several feet of the tracks on a regular basis. I spend time at this beach and I don't know how this track will be viable in a couple years, with or without rising sea levels. Once it is deemed unsafe, San Diego will be completely cut off by rail.

https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-sd-del-mar-bluf...

CalRobert• 8 years ago

Given HN's general policy of disallowing paywalled links maybe we should also consider disalling GDPR-walled links. Sure, proxies and VPN's exist but it's a PITA just to read an LATimes article.

And SD will still have the trolley from TJ at least.

sillypuddy• 8 years ago

It will be interesting to see how fast Boring company progresses and if that will be a scalable solution. If there is going to be a large capital investment, it would be great if it also sped up travel times.

tbihl2• 8 years ago

Misleading title: should be 'will drown.' Not once in the article was any current drowning of the infrastructure mentioned.

a3n• 8 years ago

Rather than thinking like a train company, wondering how to protect or move the tracks, what if they thought like a transportation company, and figured out how to move the same and projected number of people?

Although if climate inaction generally prevails, eventually the area won't be viable for that many people to live, work and commute. Problem solved.

m0llusk• 8 years ago

This might be a good opportunity to rebuild the whole thing. It has always been slow because of basic problems anyway.

igravious• 8 years ago

“More than a year and a half later, Amtrak, a private company whose stock is primarily owned by the federal government and which depends on congressional funding to operate, has yet to repeat its analysis for the network as a whole.”

So, _not_ a private company.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/2015/03/0...

(From 2015 – Supreme Court says Amtrak is more like a public entity than a private firm)

"" All the justices agreed to overturn the lower-court ruling in which the Association of American Railroads had prevailed at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit: that Amtrak was a strictly private entity and as such Congress was wrong in 2008 to set up a system that allowed it to issue regulations.

The lower court had based the decision on Congress’s command that Amtrak “is not a department, agency or instrumentality of the United States Government.”

But Justice Anthony M. Kennedy said saying so does not necessarily make it so.

The government puts all sorts of demands on Amtrak — maintaining service between Louisiana and Florida, for instance, or offering reduced fares for elderly or disabled passengers — not to mention giving it subsidies of about $1 billion a year, Kennedy said.

“Amtrak was created by the Government, is controlled by the Government, and operates for the Government’s benefit,” Kennedy wrote. Thus, in working with the Federal Railroad Administration to issue the “metrics and standards” for performance, “Amtrak acted as a governmental entity for purposes of the Constitution’s separation of powers provisions.” ""

In Ireland we call entities like this semi-state companies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State-sponsored_bodies_of_the_...

Rising Waters Are Drowning Amtrak's Northeast Corridor

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