How will climate change impact New Paltz in the future? The New Paltz Climate-smart Communities task force is helping the local governments earn the bronze designation in the state climate-smart communities program. An indirect impact was an invitation to get a new kind of free flood assessment by scientists from Woodwell Climate Research Center in Massachusetts.
Town and village officials got their first look at the results of this first-of-a-kind study during the November 4 village board meeting.
Two types of flooding are likely in New Paltz, riverine and pluvial, researcher Dominick Dusseau explained, Riverine is what it might look like when the Wallkill runs over its banks. Pluvial is when infrastructure like storm drains and culverts can’t handle the flow and get backed up, which can lead to water far from the river. Looking toward the end of the century, Dusseau’s model shows the Wallkill’s flood plain expanding and the areas prone to pluvial flooding increasing.
The storm-drain system is significantly undersized for current needs, much less than the increased amount of water that’s expected. Most culverts can only handle the volume of a one-in-20-year flood, and the flood data from the Federal Emergency Management Authority doesn’t even include this kind of flooding risk. FEMA data doesn’t consider flooding from streams, either. By 2071, what’s now a hundred-year flood will be hitting New Paltz more like once in 25 years. 50 years from now, ten percent more buildings will get floods of five inches or more, and the average flood stage will be almost half a foot higher than it is today.
This troubled Mayor Tim Rogers, who remarked that plans to build a wall around the wastewater treatment plant were scuttled due to a $40-million price tag. “We can barely afford to replace hundred-year-old water mains,” the mayor sighed. Finding the money for this future reality is hard to imagine.
Join the family! 
