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Originally Posted by NYguy
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As you are pointing out, the majority of the casualties in NYC were in Staten Island and other areas that wouldn't have been protected by these barriers anyway, and they could have made the water out of the barriers to rise more.
In the other hand, the floods in Manhattan flooded the subway and that affected the entire city. The flooding of some office buildings in Lower Manhattan also means a huge economic loss in terms of economic output, even if the buildings itselfs are not severely damaged but the companies they hold are force to be out of bussines for several days.
But the worst damage was in areas that wouldn't have been protected by these barriers anyway.
There was a debate about that in the NYT
These are two, among other four, articles that make a debate about whether they should build a storm barrier.
Big Projects, Big Problems, So Think Small
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate...so-think-small
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The original proposal to build three barriers and protect New York Harbor inside the Verrazano Narrows does not protect the 300,000 people in Brooklyn and Queens who live around Jamaica Bay within the floodplain of a Category 2-3 hurricane (below 16 feet above sea level). Worse yet, experiments with our storm surge model show that these barriers would slightly worsen the flood elevations in Jamaica Bay. So, this plan may be perceived as choosing “winners and losers,” and the area with the greater population (and votes) is in the latter group.
Another barrier proposal would protect nearly the entire city, but features massive levees over Rockaway Peninsula and other low-lying nearby land areas. Who really believes that New Yorkers will be interested in taking the “New Orleans approach” to stopping storm surges?
Also, every barrier plan that has been presented would reduce exchanges of our city’s estuarine waters with the ocean, degrading water quality and changing temperature and salinity. This would have complex effects on our rebounding ecosystems and coastal fisheries, a source of pride for a growing number of New Yorkers.
The silver lining is that now we’ll finally have the political will to tackle all the sensible, efficient defense measures we've been neglecting. A great deal of protection can come from simply making better small-scale and (this time) watertight adaptations to protect subways and electrical infrastructure, such as retractable subway stairwell domes or rubber subway air vent covers. Let’s leverage the amazing designers and engineers of New York City and have open design competitions. This could be a 1-year or 2-year process, and we could dramatically improve our resilience in the rare event that seawater comes into our city.
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I would add that a barrier at the Verrazano also will leave unprotected much of Staten Island, which had most of the casualties related with the floodings.
Worth the Investment
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate...-new-york-city
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There is no easy -- or inexpensive -- way to fully prevent the enormous damage that Hurricane Sandy inflicted on New York City. Because of the city’s location, at the confluence of the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island Sound and Hudson River, the nation's largest metropolitan economy is highly susceptible to coastal storms and tidal flooding. However, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development recently found that the metro area's lack of protective measures is an outlier when compared to better prepared peer cities like London, Tokyo and Shanghai.
Yet proposals for "hard" infrastructure investments -- like storm surge barriers -- are not new, and numerous types, styles and functions have been suggested. As a nation of innovators, I have no doubt we can engineer a solution. The new flood defense system in New Orleans passed its first tests after the devastation from Katrina in 2005. So why isn't it getting done in New York?
The cost of such a system is generally considered the most significant hindrance. To be sure, at $6 billion or so to build and about $75 million each year to operate, the costs are large. But perhaps not prohibitive compared to other projects like $15 billion for the World Trade Center reconstruction, $8 billion for the Long Island Rail Road link to the East Side of Manhattan, and even the $2.5 billion for new stadiums for the Yankees and Mets. The costs of Hurricane Sandy's devastation (more than 30 people killed, $20 billion in damage, millions in lost economic activity each day) also provide important perspective.
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Including three barriers, it would cost certainly much more than $ 6 billion.