How About Fixing Real Fort Worth Flood Issues?

This morning, prior to checking in on Facebook I did my regular habit of checking various online news sources, including the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, where I read an article titled "Fixing Fort Worth flooding issues could top $1 billion, reports says".

Well, that headline hooked my interest, what with Fort Worth already spending, supposedly, around $1 billion on flooding issues with what has become known as America's Biggest Boondoggle, also known as the Trinity River Central City Uptown Panther Island District Vision.

America's Biggest Boondoggle was, in part, supposedly supposed to solve some imaginary flood issues where no floods have occurred for over half a century, With that lack of flooding due to the fact that massive levees were installed by the Army Corps of Engineers way back in the 1950s, which have kept Central Fort Worth dry ever since.

The Boondoggle wants to remove those levees and replace them with a flood diversion ditch. However, the inept Boondoggle has been stymied for a long time now by being unable to figure out how to build three simple  little bridges over dry land to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island.

Today's Star-Telegram article about flooding issues has nothing to do with the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's inept flood control project. The article is about actual flash flooding which has repeatedly occurred in other areas of Fort Worth.

Many have long opined regarding the ridiculous wastefulness of throwing money away on an un-needed flood control project where there are no floods, while Fort Worth and Tarrant County have actual serious, deadly flash flood issues.

Such as the deadly flash floods which have occurred in Haltom City.

The Haltom City flood issues have largely been ignored, including being ignored by Congresswoman Kay Granger, who surveyed the Haltom City floods, but did nothing.

Kay Granger's efforts have gone into securing federal funds for America's Biggest Boondoggle, where there are no floods, but is a project which was able to give her son, J.D., a job for which he was totally not qualified, for which he has been paid well over $1 million during his reign of incompetence.

In typical Star-Telegram fashion, today's article about the need to spend $1 billion to fix flooding issues is a bit bizarre.

Bizarre because no mention is made of the money being wasted on the TRV Boondoggle fixing non-existent flood issues.

Two paragraphs illustrating the bizarreness of this Star-Telegram article...

“If we [spent $25 million to $35 million] we would have spent more money than we’ve ever spent to solve a single flooding issue in the city of Fort Worth and there would still be a significant flooding risk,” Simmons recently told the council.

And many other locations in the city have similar problems, but most of the serious problems are in the central city, or within Loop 820, where Simmons said the drainage system is below current standards.

If $25 to $35 million is spent this would be more than ever spent in Fort Worth on a flooding issue? How  much money has already been thrown down the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle drain?  I suspect it is well in excess of $35 million. How much was spent to build the existing levees  in the downtown Fort Worth zone?

Many other locations in the city have problems, but the most serious are in the central city?

Central City?

Isn't  Central City one of the many names which have been given the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle?

Very perplexing.

So, when I did get around to checking in on Facebook I soon saw that I was being pointed to a Facebook post about this Star-Telegram article about which I have been opining.

That Facebook post generated many comments, including a long one from TRWD board member, Mary Kelleher.  I will copy the Mary Kelleher comment below, along with a couple  other comments....

My name is Mary Kelleher and I'm currently on the Board of the TRWD (Tarrant Regional Water District). I'm frequently criticized by my fellow board members (Victor Henderson, Jack Stevens, Jim Lane, and Marty Leonard) for fighting for people like us against wasteful spending by people like them....career politicians and Fort Worth Way Good Ole Boys and Girls. I could really use your help. Here's just an example:

In 2004, the citizens of Fort Worth voted for Proposition 1; the ballot read, “The issuance of public securities for street and storm sewer improvements in the aggregate sum of $232,000,000.” What the people didn’t know was this money was going to be used for the design and construction of the Trinity River Vision. 

In 2008, citizens of Fort Worth voted for another Proposition 1. The ballot read, “The issuance of public securities for street improvements in the aggregate sum of $150,000,000.” What the people didn’t know was this money was going to be used for three bridges over the TRV bypass channel. The bridges are to be built over dry land and the water will come later IF federal funding is still available by then.

So....while millions of our tax dollars go to this frivolous economic development project disguised as flood control....parts of our city are truly suffering unprecedented flooding as the city has failed to plan for the spike in development and its effects on our now-inadequate infrastructure. 

Following Mary's comment, a couple other Facebook  comments....

Deborah Forbes: This is what the TRWD should be doing instead of buying properties, forcing businesses out, building bridges, developing waterways. They should have helped the city become more flood resistant.

And this....

Wm Atkins: In Fort Worth, Trinity River Vision Boondoggle is more important than homes being flooded.

A Tale Of Two Town's Flood Control Projects: Fort Worth & Mount Vernon

Currently, here in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex zone, we are in the midst of a thunderstorm. Usually a thunderstorm is accompanied by rain. Often in copious, flood causing amounts.

However.

No matter how much rain falls, or how high the Trinity River rises, it is highly unlikely a flood would breech the enormous levees that contain the river as it flows past downtown Fort Worth.

These levees, on the Trinity River, were built over 50 years ago, paid for by the kind taxpayers of America, after the downtown Fort Worth zone was damaged by a really bad flood at some point in time in the early 1950s, if I remember correctly.

I read some news in my old hometown newspaper, the Skagit Valley Herald, this morning, that had me being perplexed. Apparently tomorrow the Mount Vernon City Council is expected to approve a plan to borrow $1 million of the town's future federal funds, to close a funding gap on the $12.9 million cost of Phase II of Mount Vernon's Downtown Flood Protection and Revitalization Project.

Let me explain downtown Mount Vernon and its flooding issue to you.

When the Skagit River goes into big flood mode, downtown Mount Vernon becomes like New Orleans. It is below the level of the flooding river. So, a temporary sandbag dike has to be quickly built, on top of the existing dike, to keep the river from destroying downtown Mount Vernon.

In November of 1995 record rains brought record flooding to all the rivers of the Puget Sound zone. I remember watching the flooding, on TV, at 1 in the morning, when  KING  5, out of Seattle, went live to downtown Mount Vernon where the  KING 5 reporter made it sound as if a fevered effort was underway to save the downtown Mount Vernon library. The TV screen showed a beehive of activity by the library.

I remember being shocked. I woke up some help and headed to downtown Mount Vernon. At the library I found out what was actually going on was a sand bagging operation, with the filled sandbags being brought to the revetment to build a secondary dike. That was where the help was needed, so that is where we went.

Sandbag Wall in Mt. Vernon While the Skagit River Rises

There may have been well over 1,000 people in downtown Mount Vernon working to build a sandbag wall.

Hundreds of National Guard troops were helping.

Sometime around 3 in the morning we were told we'd done all we could do, the sandbags could go no higher.

The Skagit River was expected to crest around 11 that morning. It was expected to crest well over a foot above the sandbag wall. All the businesses in downtown Mount Vernon were sandbagged to help stop the expected flood.

By the time of the crest, I, along with a lot of other people, watched from high ground as the river crept to the top of the sandbag wall. Just as it was starting to go over the top, the river suddenly dropped a foot or more. Everyone was mystified. It was like there had been a divine intervention.

But, we soon were to learn what had actually happened, as emergency sirens sounded and helicopters began to appear. A dike, downriver a couple miles, had popped a couple hundred foot breech, flooding what is known as Fir Island.

Needless to say, Mount Vernon and the Skagit Valley were in a State of Emergency.

And then, 2 weeks later, after the Fir Island dike had been repaired, it happened again.

From that point Mount Vernon decided something needed to be done, after coming to the point of disaster, twice within 2 weeks. In 2007 Mount Vernon bought a mobile flood wall from a Norwegian company, the first such thing to be installed in America. Now, just a few people can put up a wall in a couple hours, where previously it took half a day and 100s of workers.

But, this was a temporary solution. Phase II of the Downtown Flood Protection and Revitalization Project replaces the mobile flood wall with a permanent solution that will take downtown Mount Vernon off FEMA's list of vulnerable flood zones.

That is a list that downtown Fort Worth is not on.

Now, how is it that Fort Worth and its bizarro Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has gotten millions of federal dollars for an un-needed flood control project that will build a likely ridiculous looking, un-needed flood diversion channel, so that the levees that have stopped flooding for decades can be removed?

Meanwhile, Mount Vernon, which has an actual, real, flood problem, that has caused problems for decades, scrambles to find the money to build a permanent fix.

Is this a function of the fact that the congressperson who represents the district in which Mount Vernon is located is not a corrupt politician willing to finagle shady deals to channel federal money Mount Vernon's way, whilst Fort Worth is represented by a corrupt congresswoman who stands to make financial gains from the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle which she has helped to fund, which, in addition to providing her financial gain, also provided her son, J.D. Granger, the job of running the project, a job for which J.D. Granger has absolutely zero qualifications?

The installing her son to run the TRV Boondoggle is sufficient cause to attach the "corrupt" label to this corrupt politician, let alone all the other reasons.

Why do not more people find the TRV Boondoggle's wastefulness and lack of need to be perplexing, particularly when there are locations in America where money could be spent to fix an actual flooding problem?

Places like Haltom City and Mount Vernon.

If you'd asked me if the 1995 flood I'm talking about above was the infamous Thanksgiving Day Flood, I would have said, yes it was. If you'd asked me if this was the flood that sank one of the Lake Washington floating bridges, I would have said yes it was.

Well, just a little Googling let me know I was wrong about the Thanksgiving Day Flood. That flood was in 1990 and was the one that sank the floating bridge.

The fact that I get confused about Western Washington's floods and the fact that some of them have names, should be a good indication of how bad the flooding in that rainy zone can be.

I remember watching the floating bridge sink, on TV, at my sister's cabin at Lake Cushman. That fact confuses me for a variety of reasons. One of which is I also remember being at Seattle's Gasworks Park watching my aunt finish a marathon in the rainstorm that sank the floating bridge. But, I'm further confused, because I remember being up in Lynden, at the Dutch Mother's Restaurant, because my grandma wanted to have all her kids and grandkids together for a turkey dinner for the first time in decades. I remember that night as the night the rain started that became the flood known as the Thanksgiving Flood. Apparently I was all over Western Washington during that flooding period, all the way to the Canadian border, to Seattle, to Hood Canal.

That or my memory is really mixed up.

Below is a YouTube video of part of the KING 5 report about the sinking. There is footage of the actual sinking, which happened live on TV, if I'm remembering right, which I've fairly clearly established may not be the case...

High Water Rapids On The Trinity River In Fort Worth

That is the Trinity River in east Fort Worth in flood mode Thursday around noon. The river had come down from its highwater mark, but was still roaring over the Gateway Park/Trinity Trails Dam Trail Bridge.

This was the location I showed you a few weeks ago, near Beach Street, where gas drillers were sucking water out of the Trinity River. The gas pump was busy pumping yesterday, but I could barely hear it over the roar of the water.

The river had dropped about 10 feet by the time I saw it. You can easily tell the highwater mark by the line of litter left behind.

It is back being clear here in North Texas again with a beautiful blue sky. But it is cold. Mid 40s when my usual going to the pool time came. I decided I didn't need to go swimming.

Miss Puerto Rico Is In Miami Heading To Cold Flooding Texas

That's the Thursday 10am in the morning, balcony view, in what is likely the last in the current "View From Miss Puerto Rico's" series.

As you can see a layer of gray is blocking our usual view of a Texas blue sky. We have had a big delivery of rain in the past 24 hours. The Trinity River is above flood stage in some locations. A weather alert just informed me that the West Fork of the Trinity River will be flooding parts of Grand Prairie until sometime Friday.

The majority of you reading this are not Texans. So, I'll explain that Grand Prairie is east of Arlington, west of Dallas. Arlington is where the Dallas Cowboys play football. The Dallas Cowboys do not play football in Dallas.

Near as I can tell Dallas thinks the entire Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex zone is all Dallas with the 50 or 60 Metroplex towns, like Fort Worth, Arlington, Frisco, Grapevine and all the rest, being Dallas neighborhoods.

So, now you know why it makes perfectly good sense for the Dallas Cowboys to build a $1.2 billion new stadium in the Dallas neighborhood of Arlington and still call themselves the Dallas Cowboys.

The aforementioned Miss Puerto Rico called a few minutes ago. She is now in Miami. She was not pleased when I told her what the weather is like here. When I went in the pool this morning, at 7, it was raining and 61. Now, 3.5 hours later it is not raining, but it is windy and the temperature has dropped 10 degrees.

So, I picked up a coat for her when I was over at Miss PR's taking my daily balcony picture and feeding the cat. I told Miss PR to stay inside the terminal til I got the coat to her.

Non-Stop Rain Has Texas Flooding, 9/12 Protest In Fort Worth, Key To The City For Glenn Beck & Jon Stewart

That is a flooded Interstate 35, southbound, flooded on Saturday by this non-stop deluge we've got falling on us here in North Texas. It has been raining for about 24 hours now.

This morning, walking to the pool, the shots of water stung a bit. When I was in the pool the rain switched to downpour mode. When I got out of the pool I didn't notice the rain hitting me. Of course, I did not bother drying off. What would have been the point?

I've not heard from the Haltom City Fossil Creek monitor this morning, except for a fervent plea for help on a non-flood related problem. I assume since no mention was made of her creek condition it must be staying in its banks.

Despite the deluge, yesterday's 9/12 protest march went on in downtown Fort Worth. My sources on the ground tell me there were about 1,000 people marching around, some under umbrellas, some carrying signs, saying things like, "Obamacare makes me sick," some chanting things like, "No more czars" and "You lie."

The 9/12 protest was the brainchild of conservative talk show guy, Glenn Beck. Glenn Beck is from my old hometown of Mount Vernon, Washington. A controversy erupted in Mount Vernon, recently, when it was announced the mayor wanted to give Beck the Keys to the City. As you might guess, Mount Vernon is a very liberal town. After an awful lot of protesting, Mount Vernon went ahead with the give Beck the Keys to the City plan. I don't actually know what that gets you to get the Keys to the City of Mount Vernon. I also do not know if Beck has been given the Keys to the City yet.

Meanwhile, the next big city to the north, Bellingham, where I have also lived, countered Mount Vernon by offering the Keys to the City of Bellingham to liberal TV personality Jon Stewart. Near as I can tell Jon Stewart's tenuous connection to Bellingham is Stewart went to the same high school as the Mayor of Bellingham, Dan Pike, who offered the keys.

Below is part of the Mayor of Bellingham's letter to Jon Stewart...

I am writing because I am currently the Mayor of Bellingham, Washington, a community of about 80,000 between Vancouver, BC and Seattle, WA. The next city south of us on I-5, Mount Vernon (pop. 30,000), has just announced they are giving the keys to that city to Glenn Beck, a native son. The news got me to thinking that if they could give Beck a key simply for being born there, perhaps Bellingham could provide a key to Mr. Stewart for the better reasons of providing cogent yet comedic analysis of news events and personalities on a daily basis, as well as being an alumnus of the same high school as Bellingham's Mayor. I was particularly moved and informed by the Daily Show's recent analysis of the evolution of Glenn Beck's feelings about the US healthcare system over the past couple of years.

We are bigger and better than Mount Vernon, and so are interested in a bigger, better star to receive our key. As an added bonus, should Mr. Stewart accept, we would try to track down Stephen, the eagle from the Colbert Report who frequently lives in our county, so Jon could have a personal sighting. If Mr. Colbert would like to receive a key to Bellingham, too, he is also welcome. If Mr. Stewart cannot come to Bellingham to accept, perhaps I could deliver it at some time in the months ahead, when I come to Lawrenceville to visit my mother.

While this is a joke of sorts, intended as a counterpoint to the Beck event in Mount Vernon, the offer is serious.

It Is Thursday And We Are Still Heavy Duty Storming In Texas

That's my closed in stormy view at 11 this morning. We have now been storming here in Fort Worth and North Texas for about 17 hours, give or take a few.

This is the worst Mother Nature behavior I can remember in a long time. The caretaker of the Haltom City creeks is having a lot of extra worrying being forced upon her today, due to Mother Nature and the inept local powers that be who have done nothing to fix the Haltom City creek flooding woes in all the time since their deadly flash flooding a couple years ago.

The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center has just issued a Severe Thunderstorm Watch until 6 pm.

I had planned to go to Veterans Park in Arlington and then to Arlington's Chinatown. I don't think that is going to work out.

This is the first good test of how all that new paved parking at the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium is going to affect runoff into Johnson Creek. Johnson Creek flooded into Six Flags, even before the Dallas Cowboys removed a lot of acreage of water absorbing land, replacing it with water repellers, like asphalt and a huge stadium. I'm guessing 6 inches in 2 hours and we'll be looking at a Dallas Cowboys Stadium caused massive flooding of Six Flags.

That'll be interesting. I suspect the Johnson Creek problem will get fixed before the flooding problem in Haltom City, that has killed people, gets fixed.