DOUG'S MIRACLE BRIDGE THAT WASN'T

October 05, 2020

DOUG'S MIRACLE BRIDGE THAT WASN'T

Escambia County Commissioner Doug Underhill ran for re-election championing his plan to fix the decades old issue of flooding around Jones Creek. This was especially true regarding the Forest Creek Apartment complex which has flooded repeatedly. FEMA and the rest of the Board of County Commissioners wanted to buy out the complex and demolish the structures because of this area’s natural tendency to flood. In the end, Underhill got his way and the FEMA plan was abandoned. Fast forward to September 2020 and the Forest Creek apartments were once again under water. Why didn’t Commissioner Underhill’s fixes prevent this and should he have known better?

This is a human created problem caused by a lack of planning by county commissioners over the last 70 years. There’s been an overly optimistic belief the problem could be engineered away. This fiction made it easy to keep saying yes to the deep pockets of developers that fund local elections. This is a case study in the failures that can occur when science is ignored in favor of unchecked growth.

These apartments sit next to Jones Creek, also known as Jones Swamp, which hints to the problem. This creek is often only a couple feet wide and shallow enough to wade across. However, during a heavy rain the west Escambia watershed that drains into this creek rapidly turns it into a raging river. A map of this watershed is the featured photo at the top of this article. When you look at the natural terrain on topographical maps and old aerial photography the problem becomes apparent. Before modern construction changed the landscape, this periodic flooding could drain quicker over a wider area. This meant the flooding was shallower and less destructive.

1958 aerial photo of the area

As the West side of Escambia County began building up during the 1950s and 60s, developers and government officials hoped to avoid the inevitable flooding by building roadways and commercial developments on raised platforms. This largely worked for these specific areas. When Walmart built their store about 100 yards directly downstream of the apartments, they raised the ground enough that it didn’t flood in Hurricane Sally. However, this strategy didn’t make the floodwaters disappear, it simply concentrated the floods in other areas.

The effect of this is the Navy Boulevard corridor is effectively a dam that forces all the water to drain through the narrow banks of the Jones Creek past the bridges on Navy Blvd and Old Corry Field Road. Essentially the Forest Creek Apartments sit in a man-made dry lakebed that fills up anytime there is a major rain event.

Further contributing to the problem are the upstream housing subdivisions that were built on swamp lands. This has two significant implications. First, the combined effect of all these buildings and roadways is an increase in the amount of hard surfaces that don’t absorb any of the rain. The result is more water draining into Jones Creek than in the past. Second, these communities changed the natural flow of the water, concentrating it in one direction.

Finally, there’s the 800-pound gorilla in the room, climate change. There are real world observations that show the climate is changing and we’re already experiencing the effects. The total annual precipitation isn’t expected to increase in NW Florida, but we can expect longer periods of drought with more intense periods of rainfall. Today’s heavy rainfall events in the Southeastern U.S. are producing 30% more rainfall than in the 1950’s, a trend that is expected to continue accelerating. The three largest rainfall (LINK) events in U.S. history have occurred since 2016 and that doesn’t even include Hurricane Sally. Of course, there have always been big rainstorms and it’s impossible to attribute any one storm to climate change. But the evidence indicates that the 2014 and 2020 floods aren’t once in a century rain events anymore. Underhill has called climate change junk science, however the reality is we’re likely to see rainfall totals like this once a decade, if not more often, in the coming years.

That’s a summary of the problem, but what to do about it now. Reverting the west side of Escambia back to its natural state probably isn’t a realistic option. Listening to Doug Underhill you might think he’s a trained flood water engineer. However, when you look critically at his statements and actions it’s pretty clear he’s just blowing smoke. Nowhere is that more apparent than with the ongoing Forest Creek situation.

To be fair to Underhill, this isn’t a problem he created and there’s no simple fix. Following the 2014 flood there was a movement to get a FEMA grant to buy out these apartments because it seemed apparent to everyone that this location isn’t compatible with a housing complex. Well, apparent to everyone but Underhill. FEMA awarded the grant, but from the beginning Underhill opposed it.

Underhill’s primary solution was to replace the bridge over Old Corry Field Road that washed out in the flood of 2014. The new bridge would allow a greater flow of water to relieve upstream flooding. After 5 years of Underhill dragging his feet on the new bridge, we finally have it. I don’t think anyone can deny that it’s a significant improvement over the old box-culvert style bridge. The fact that the new bridge survived the hurricane Sally’s flooding no worse for the wear is testimony to that.

The problem is, as good as the new bridge is, it doesn’t solve the flooding problem. Only about a quarter of a mile upstream is another box-culvert bridge taking Navy Blvd over Jones Creek. The new bridge on Old Corry Field Road did little to prevent the flooding upstream of Navy Blvd. This problem was so apparent that even a layperson like me was able to point this out in a Facebook post back in November 2018.

I don’t know if Underhill saw my post, but we do know that he was aware of the problem. In May 2018 Escambia County Stormwater Engineering Manager Chris Curb sent an email stating, “The Old Corry bridge . . . is not going to resolve flooding at Forest Creek Apts.” Underhill’s response was to excoriate Mr. Curb to his supervisor for being unprofessional and to suggest that he should run for County Commissioner if he wants to have a say in fixing the flooding problem.

The arrogance of Commissioner Underhill is stunning. And guess what? Hurricane Sally has shown the stormwater engineer knew more about the flooding dynamics at Forest Creek Apartments than the Commissioner. Who could have guessed? During a major rain event there’s just more water than what can drain through the creek bed.

Resident points out the Hurricane Sally flooding highwater mark. Originally

published in the Pensacola News Journal, 17 Sep 2020.

Underhill seems to sense this recent flooding event makes him look bad. Since the Hurricane he’s been highlighting the fact that the owners of the Forest Creek Apartments were reluctant to accept the buyout offer, glossing over the fact that he also opposed the buyout. Doug even patted himself on the back because the flood waters receded quicker this time than in 2014. He doesn’t mention that the flood was slow to recede in 2014 because of the debris from the washed-out bridge was clogging the creek, not because of the basic design of the bridge.

Doug Underhill has also tried to argue that flooding is just part of living in Escambia County, comparing these apartments to his wealthy neighborhood on Perdido Key. He’s completely oblivious to the differences between millionaires buying beachfront properties and the working poor who need government housing vouchers just to get by. Doug’s neighbors sought out beachfront properties despite the risk and have the resources to deal with storm damage. That’s simply not the case with most of the people living at Forest Creek.

The issue is more complicated than just this bridge. There’s also a recently completed major storm water project in the Beach Haven neighborhood designed to help with the flooding. Underhill has linked this project to preventing flooding on Jones Creek. However, even the Commissioner has stated this project is primarily designed to stop flooding on Gulf Beach Highway, not Jones Creek. It may be a good project, but it’s impact on flooding at Forest Creek isn’t significant. There’s also a plan for a project to restore the Jones Swamp floodplain. This project sounds good, however the county’s website has no information about it other than the fact that it’s on-hold. Doug keeps touting these miracle projects that are going to solve the problem, yet here we are with the Forest Creek Apartments flooded and no realistic plan to prevent it from happening again.

One of Commissioner Underhill’s pet projects will actually make the problem worse. Another neighborhood in his district with a history of flooding is Lake Charlene. They had large-scale flooding in 2014 and significant flooding again this year. The lake in this neighborhood is essentially a de facto stormwater retention pond. The problem is water enters faster than it can drain during major rain events. There are plans to add another drainage line to double the outflow. It’s the logical engineering solution to the problem. However, the net result will be more water flowing into Jones Creek at a faster rate once the project is complete. That can only lead to more intense flooding downstream where the Forest Creek Apartments sit.

To be clear, removing these apartments creates new problems as well. There’s already a low-income housing shortage and this complex is conveniently located near shopping and mass transit. However, Underhill has a long history of opposing affordable housing projects. His sudden concern for low-income housing is a political convenience rather than genuine concern. Addressing how to replace these units needs to be part of the plan. Regardless, the need for affordable housing doesn’t change the fact this location is not compatible with an apartment complex.

Commissioner Underhill’s pitch on the Forest Creek Apartments sounds reasonable. Why buyout and demolish the complex when you can use that money to fix the flooding to begin with. The truth is there’s just too much water concentrated in too small an area to make this problem go away. The flooding at Forest Creek shows the dangers of basing policy on magical thinking instead of facts. The result is always going to be the hard slap of reality in the end.

Note: Special thanks to Melissa Pino who obtained the emails from Commissioner Underhill and county engineer Chris Curb through a freedom of information request.

DOUG'S MIRACLE BRIDGE THAT WASN'T

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