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SOUTH FLORIDA BEACHFRONT PROPERTIES THREATENED BY RISING SEAS
BY OCTAVIO NUIRY, MANAGING EDITOR
Concerns about rising sea levels remain a rarity among most South Florida homeowners and investors, but despite the threat of rising sea levels, the drive to develop Florida’s coastline continues, exposing residential and commercial property owners to potential flood risk. According climate experts, the inundation of coastal communities has begun. And in places like Miami Beach, the sea has crept up so high that all it takes is a high tide and a brisk wind to send water pouring into streets, businesses and homes.
of sea level rise, experts claim. More than 90 percent of the 20 million residents of the Sunshine State live on the coast, according to the scientific journal Nature . According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, sea levels could rise by more than 3 feet by 2100. For hundreds of thousands of Floridian coastal homeowners, a reckoning with Mother Nature is not far off in the future, experts warn. And as sea levels rise, flooding threatens both real estate values and the tourism economy of South Florida. “If a rise of 58 centimeters were realized by 2050, it would cost Florida $92 billion per year owing to losses in tourism and real estate, among other factors, with costs rising exponentially thereafter,” wrote Nature science writer Mark
Schrope. “By 2060, with a rise of 68 centimeters, 9 percent of Florida’s land area would be gone, including virtually the entire Florida Keys.” The rising sea levels could be an existential threat to South Florida real estate, according to Orrin H. Pilkey, professor emeritus of geology at Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment in Durham, North Carolina, and a proponent of greater constraint on coastal development. Professor Pilkey insists that no amount of engineering infrastructure will stop the onslaught of rising seas. Miami Beach Is ‘Doomed’ “Miami is doomed,” said Pilkey, who questions the wisdom of high-density
Already, South Florida is “ground zero” for the potential adverse economic impact
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