What's more current than the weather?

[Beestie]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Luckily, I have Friday off. 3 feet is unheard of in DC.

I think that will still be the case next week. I doubt we crack 24 inches - my guess is 18 inches.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

When is your flight scheduled to land, Friday or Saturday?

10:30ish Saturday morning.

[Undertoad]

This local forecast, using the latest models as of right now, says the heavy parts won't be reaching the NYC area by then. You'l land in an inch or two of snow if they are right, and then by Sunday morning there will be 6-10". So they say. It will probably be wrong because the north side cutoff of this storm is very tight.

http://pix11.com/2016/01/20/winter-s...ri-state-area/

(it's all about me dep't: we'll be making the same trip in a month - J's daughter got her an NYC trip for Christmas, tix to The Book of Mormon)

[xoxoxoBruce]

Damn, that's going to be a tough one for the headline typesetters, "The Clodfobble Storm of '16".

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

J's daughter got her an NYC trip for Christmas, tix to The Book of Mormon)

Nice! Do you know the story/soundtrack at all, or are you going in blind?

[Undertoad]

I know the basic idea but probably not much more than a Playbill summary. And I already know one of the songs, I think someone might have linked it here.

[Griff]

We saw it in Buffalo for Lil' G's Bday maybe three years ago. Great show. And now she goes to Hamilton so this is actually all about me.

[DanaC]

Originally Posted by tw

Is structure construction required to also install flood retention basins?

I don't know exactly what is required. As I understand it, what is needed at the moment isa more joined up approach. Much of the flood defense strategies have been very localised, when what is needed is a more regional response.

There is some construction involved, I believe, but not sure what that is.

In the wake ofthe last really bad floods a few years ago, there was a move to get something better in place - some of that work was done, but some of it was still being worked out - a potential plan of action was drawn up and costed, but central government reduced the budget fairly recently, despite warnings from the floods agency that the number of properties affected by flooding was likely to rise drastically compared to previous years.

My friends' house in Tod had a couple of feet of water in their cellar and further down the street a houses had water up into the ground floor - that's the first time, apparently, in 20 years that the street has flooded.

[xoxoxoBruce]

That's the problem when they terminate(cut funding) of a project before it's finished, either what has been completed makes things worse or collapses without the reinforcement of the rest.

[Happy Monkey]

An inch of snow on untreated roads last night. It took me 3 hours to get home. And I had some scary moments. Sometimes it's not great to live at the highest point in DC.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

I know the basic idea but probably not much more than a Playbill summary. And I already know one of the songs, I think someone might have linked it here.

That was prolly me. I'm excited for you, you'll absolutely love it.

In weather news, I'm sitting in the parking lot of an Academy waiting for them to open so I can buy a set of long underwear, and proper gloves, and scarves (of which we own zero) for everyone.

[glatt]

That inch of snow caught everyone by surprise and they didn't treat the roads at all.

I had a 7:30pm meeting that was fortunately cancelled, and I just sat at home on my couch watching all the stories coming in on social media and watching the cars failing to make the corner on my street and then once they got straightened out again struggling to make it up the gentle slope (not even a hill) in front of my house.

Check out the time stamps on these two screen shots I took last night. This is way past rush hour.
Look at all the accidents at around 8PM!


And the traffic jams still going on long after the snow had stopped.
This was 10:13PM!

[Happy Monkey]

I left work at 9pm, and got home at midnight.

There were probably several accidents I avoided just because the car in front of me couldn't stop either.

My first choice route to get to my home had a stuck bus at the top of the hill. I backed down (briefly getting stuck within 2 feet of a stopped car, worried that if I let off the brakes, I'd hit them no matter which way the wheels were turning), and tried a couple of other approaches. Each time, it was too slick. Once I slid back down to the bottom of the hill sideways, after losing grip during a U-turn. Once I lightly hit the median curb. Finally, I drove back out of the city, and came in on a different road.

When back in my neighborhood, I parked as far downhill as was available.

[tw]

Originally Posted by DanaC

I don't know exactly what is required. As I understand it, what is needed at the moment isa more joined up approach. Much of the flood defense strategies have been very localised, when what is needed is a more regional response.

Mistake is to build more leeves. For example, to protect a flood plain of east St Louis, they kept upgrading that leeve. It is now 50 feet (15 meters) high. That was not a solution. River between St Louis and Illinois is only a mile wide. So it backs up. Under Clinton (when FEMA was managed by professionals), towns such as Gafton Il were moved to higher ground. To create more flood plains. If a town floods, either levees downstream must be removed. Or that land must become a floodplain.

Best on floodplains are stadiums, parking lots, parks, swamps, and forests, and corn fields. Flooded homes means nobody should have been living there.

Of course, once Brownie took over FEMA (remember New Orleans and Katrina), then cost controls replaced productive actions.

Same is what responsible reporters would be asking in the Midlands. Upstream construction without retention basins means larger flood plains must be constructed downstream - not more leeves. But that means making decisions based upon the product - not in short term finance thinking as taught in business schools.

Question to be asked in the Midlands. Was that flooding due to business school graduates and a love of higher leeves? Or was it an exception; something that will not happen again in 100 years? Remember, new construction upstream means more water requiring larger flood plains downstream. Are retention basins routinely installed on up to 10% of each lot used in new construction? If not, then that is the serious problem - not the resulting flooding.

[lumberjim]

That sounds like no fun at all, HM. I remember doing a slow motion 360 down a hill in my jeep Cherokee. 4x4 was on, but it was light snow on top of icy crust from a melt, refreeze . It's like a dream memory. Silent.