Superstorm Sandy devastated the Incorporated Village of Island Park three years ago, inundating the community with 6 to 8 feet of sea water and flooding every home and business. The Village is still struggling to overcome Sandy’s impacts and lingering fears of damaging floods due to widespread drainage problems.
The Village recently awarded Walden Environmental Engineering, PLLC (Walden) a contract to conduct a comprehensive drainage study to evaluate its drainage system and generate a strategy for infrastructure upgrades to reduce flooding in Island Park, resulting in a more resilient, flood-protected community. Funding for this project will be provided through FEMA’s Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMGP).
Walden has a long history of working with the Village of Island Park, dating back to 2003, and serving as the Village Engineer since 2007. Much of our work has revolved around drainage, and we helped the Village conceptualize many aspects of this drainage system improvements project years ago. Much of the baseline drainage system inventory work has been completed through past Walden projects, and our designs for some aspects of the drainage improvements (bulkheads, swirl separators and catch basin inserts) are ready to go. Walden knows how important this project is and we are committed to helping the Village and its residents. Now is the time to move forward and take action to eliminate flooding using the well-deserved HMGP funding as the catalyst for these improvements.
Walden has assembled a team of surveyors, civil engineers, structural engineers and environmental engineers to efficiently and cost-effectively complete this project. We will inventory and evaluate the existing storm drainage system to characterize its current conditions, limitations and deficiencies. Based on this evaluation, Walden will prepare a Comprehensive Drainage Study and Plan identifying drainage infrastructure upgrade projects to mitigate storm water and tidal flooding within the study area and thus reduce damage to private, public, municipal and institutional properties. The plan will articulate our findings to the Village; propose improvements; estimate the costs of proposed improvements; and evaluate the impacts and benefits associated with the various alternatives. Our approach to completing this project will provide the Village with a range of tangible results presented in a hierarchy of alternatives based on effectiveness to reduce flooding in the areas of highest risk to ensure less damage and rapid response and recovery in the wake of future severe weather events.
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