ABOUT CATASTROPHIC FLOODING IN NEW YORK

It’s way too late for either the city or state to do anything about the catastrophic flooding that drenched New York Wednesday night, killing more than a dozen people, crippling the subways and destroying untold amounts of property. The necessary tasks now are drying out and assessing the damage, followed in short order by marshaling all the resources available from the federal government and private insurers, and then spending smartly on infrastructure upgrades that will pay the biggest dividends to lessen flood risk, whether it comes from rising seas or biblical downpours.

It is an abomination that nearly nine years after Superstorm Sandy, we’ve made so little progress in building a more flood-resilient city. On a planet redefined by climate change and the extreme weather it brings, in a low-lying city with a more than century-old sewer system and 520 miles of coastline, the dunk tank we just became — courtesy of rainfall that broke a record set just two weeks ago — is a prelude of worse to come. A “Stormwater Resiliency Plan” issued by the mayor’s office in May says improvements during the last 30 years “have increased NYC’s capacity to absorb extreme rainfall.” We don’t doubt that, but it all feels like a drop in a bucket now. That same report outlines four goals: informing the public about flood vulnerability; updating flash flood response procedures; better predicting future risk; and investing in projects to mitigate future flooding. The No. 4 priority must be the first, with an emphasis on getting the world’s best engineering talent to make water flow better through our century-old sewer system.