Another Andrew could devastate South Fla.
A similar hurricane could exact a hefty toll: $300 billion
Twenty-five years ago this month, Hurricane Andrew unleashed its Category 5 wrath on South Florida, sending a catastrophic reminder about the dangers of living in the heart of “hurricane alley.”
Drive along any coastline in Florida today, and you’ll find construction cranes as plentiful as palm trees as developers rush to build highrises in the most beautiful, and vulnerable, corners of the state.
Florida improved standards for construction to prevent the level of damage wrought by hurricanes, but an Andrew-like storm hitting downtown Miami and its ever-growing collection of sparkling skyscrapers could exact a hefty price: $300 billion, according to one insurance underwriter.
“And that number doesn’t include loss of taxes or tourism,” said Monica Ningen, chief property underwriter for the USA and Canada for Swiss Re, one of the largest reinsurance companies in the world.
In the 25 years since Andrew made landfall on Aug. 24, 1992, nearly one in 10 homes built in the USA were built in Florida, according to an analysis of building permits conducted for USA TODAY by the real estate website Trulia. That’s second only to Texas.
The trend is even more pronounced for larger condo build-
ings. Florida accounts for 11.5% of new residential buildings with at least five residences over the past
25 years, trailing only Texas’
12.7%, according to the Trulia analysis.
“We’re like lemmings going to the sea, except that we build condos, hotels and houses,” said Richard Olson, director of the International Hurricane Research Center at Florida International University.
The dangers of Florida’s postAndrew growth are clearly illustrated in a report from Swiss Re that examined Florida’s vulnerability to hurricanes.
Andrew caused $24.5 billion in insured property damage when it hit the working-class suburb of Homestead about 20 miles south of downtown Miami. It was the most expensive catastrophe in U.S. history. Since then, MiamiDade County’s population has increased by more than a third. If a similar storm hit the same spot, Swiss Re estimates it would cause closer to $60 billion in insured damage.
HIGH-RISE HAZARDS
Part of the reason for those massive numbers is the explosion of high-rise condos.
Florida toughened its building codes after Andrew and saw good results in a spate of four hurricanes that struck the state in
2004. Then in 2005, Hurricane Wilma revealed a glaring weakness.
Wilma, a Category 2 hurricane, was far weaker than Andrew when it crossed over Miami, but its 100-mph winds shattered windows throughout downtown. One reason: Wind speeds grow drastically at higher altitudes.
Wilma’s 75-mph winds on the ground grew to 115 mph on the
30th floor, according to a hurricane wind model created by Florida International University in Miami. No condos collapsed, but the window failures caused massive damage.
“The structure looks great from the outside, and yet the building has to be gutted because of the water damage inside,” said Shahid Hamid, director of the Laboratory for Insurance, Financial and Economic Research at FIU.
If such a catastrophic risk looms, why do Floridians continue to build such high structures right on the coast?
For developers, the answer is simple. “Anybody that owns a piece of property should be able to do what they like with it, as long as they’re complying with the laws,” said Jeremy Stewart, a Crestview, Fla., developer and chairman of the Florida Home Builders Association.
Developers aren’t just interested in the principles of individual freedom or property rights, said Craig Fugate, former head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. It comes down to money, Fugate said. As each new glasscovered skyscraper goes up along Florida’s coasts, developers reap a windfall of profits. The money drives businesses and puts taxes into government coffers.
Real estate attorneys, Realtors, agents, architects and contractors all get a piece. Every condo that goes up in Pensacola or Tampa or Jacksonville means more tax revenue for those city governments. Florida is one of seven states that don’t collect personal income tax, so real estate taxes and fees included in every home purchase are crucial to keep the state’s finances afloat.
Fugate said that has created a “vicious cycle” of transactions that the state has grown to rely on.
“Our economy is building houses, apparently,” said Fugate, who lives in northern Florida and used to run the state’s emergency management division before heading FEMA. “Our bias now seems to be to the benefit of the transaction, not the homeowner.”
Some city leaders said it’s not that nefarious. In Miami Beach, the tourist mecca that is at the front line of Florida’s battles against climate change, leaders said the tax revenue from new developments are the only way they can afford to make the long-term improvements to gird the barrier island from rising water.
The city is in the midst of a
$500 million project to raise roads, raise seawalls and install
80 pumps to push out floods that occur even on sunny days.
New York and New Jersey received billions in federal funding after Superstorm Sandy, just as New Orleans did after Hurricane Katrina.
Since a hurricane hasn’t hit Miami and Miami Beach directly in decades, they are left to improve their infrastructure mostly on their own.
James Murley, chief resilience officer for Miami-Dade County, said the dangers of hurricanes and sea level rise are simply the price of living in paradise, just as Californians are willing to deal with the occasional earthquake.
“You have to live with the risk,” he said. “Why are they still building in San Francisco? Why are they still building in Los Angeles? They’re on established fault lines. Communities that have a history, they’re going to grow one way or the other.”
THE BOTTOM LINE
There’s no slowdown in sight, so experts said Florida has two choices: grow farther from the coast, or grow smarter.
Jean-Pierre Bardet, dean of the college of engineering at the University of Miami, said the only way that developers will stop building skyscrapers right along the water will come down to money. Florida’s building codes have made construction more expensive over the years. Some developers have gone beyond those codes to create safer, and costlier, buildings.
For example, many new highrises in Florida don’t have a street-level entrance for pedestrians. They begin with several floors of parking on the ground floors, then a lobby higher up, topped off by apartments or offices. That means only cars parked at those levels will be damaged if a hurricane pushes in storm surge or rising sea levels create more regular flooding.
Those kinds of measures are expensive, and Bardet said their prices will increase as the projects become harder to engineer.
Some cities and counties are taking a “smart growth” approach by hiring “resilience officers” who devise growth plans that account for the potential environmental effects of climate change.
Jane Gilbert, who became the city of Miami’s first chief resilience officer in 2015, said it has been tough to persuade everyone of the value of planning, but some do see a long-term benefit.
“Luckily, we have some progressively minded developers, architects and land-use attorneys who get it,” Gilbert said. Those people understand “that if we don’t start building with a longterm view, their investments are at risk.”