Tall buildings and ocean levels are causing New York City to sink, study says
Pressure from New York City’s massive buildings is making some areas more susceptible to sinking into the ocean, according to a new study.
Scott L. Hall, USA TODAY
Scientists have found that much of New York City is slowly sinking, putting the region at increased risk of flooding, according to a study published this week.
A team of scientists from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Rutgers University in Southern California and Rutgers University in New Jersey published the study in Science Advances. They found that the metropolitan area was sinking by an average of 0.06 inches per year.
The study comes after New York Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a state of emergency on Friday and heavy rains caused flash flooding in Manhattan, Staten Island and Brooklyn.
Scientists studied the vertical movement of land in the region from 2016 to 2023 to determine how much the land was sinking or rising. They used interferometric synthetic aperture radar to study the topography of the land.
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“Many of the movements they observed occurred in areas where prior modifications to the ground surface, such as filling or construction of a landfill, had loosened the ground beneath subsequent buildings and made it more susceptible to compaction.” Sally Younger of NASA’s Earth Science News Team writes: Wednesday.
The research revealed that Arthur Ashe Stadium was built on a reclaimed land in Flushing. The Queens neighborhood is sinking the fastest at a rate of 0.18 inches per year. Meanwhile, Woodside, Queens, is rising at a rate of 0.27 inches per year.
A similar study was published in May Oceanographers at the University of Rhode Island and the U.S. Geological Survey have found that many large buildings in New York City are contributing to land subsidence.
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LaGuardia Airport is also sinking at a rate of about 0.15 inches per year, according to the study. According to the airport websiteis in the middle of. $8 billion renovation To address some long-standing issues and alleviate major flooding. The international airport is located next to Flushing His Bay in Queens.
Outside of New York City, the New Jersey communities of Newark, Kearny, and Harrison are sinking. The study did not reveal how quickly the site would sink.
Sea levels in Manhattan’s Battery Park have been rising 0.12 inches a year since the 1900s, putting the metropolitan area under threat of subsidence, researchers say. Recently, sea levels have been rising at a rate of 0.17 inches per year.
according to NASA sea level prediction toolScientists predict that sea levels will rise by 0.04 inch by 2100.
“While the city has long dealt with coastal flooding from both hurricanes and temperate storms, ongoing sea level rise means that storm surges associated with severe weather events will become more prevalent, as seen with Superstorm Sandy in 2012. It is becoming destructive,” the scientists wrote.
Part of Queens, the Rise of Brooklyn
The study shows it’s not all doom and gloom for the country’s most populous city. East Williamsburg in Brooklyn and Woodside in Queens are on the rise.
Scientists believe that this percentage in Brooklyn is due to oil spilling from Newton Creek, which is located between Queens and Brooklyn and flows into the East River.
But for many parts of New York City, the outlook is not so good.
Oceanographers and researchers discovered during city survey in May has over 1 million buildings and weighs approximately 1.7 trillion pounds. Studies show that cities sink between 0.03 and 0.08 inches per year.
The study found signs of land subsidence in parts of Lower Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island.
They concluded that whenever high-rise buildings are built on coasts, rivers, or lakes, they contribute to future flood risk and “may need to include mitigation strategies.”
Contributors: Camille Fine, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, USA TODAY.