- October 23, 2024
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Black Alder Drive on Saturday, Oct. 12 after Hurricane Milton. Photo by Sierra Williams
In just one day, city pump trucks cleared out all the water on Black Alder Drive. Photo courtesy of Palm Coast
Black Alder Drive after Hurricane Milton. Courtesy of Ralph and Ivette Esposito
Ralph Esposito on Black Alder Drive after Hurricane Milton. Courtesy of Ralph and Ivette Esposito
City pump trucks cleared out all the water from Hurricane Milton on Black Alder Drive by Sunday, Oct. 13. Photo courtesy of Palm Coast
Ralph and Ivette Esposito, who live in the 40 block of Black Alder Drive in the Woodlands neighborhood, thought they had seen the worst post-hurricane flooding from Hurricanes Irma and Nicole.
Ivette Esposito said, after Hurricane Nicole, the city told Woodlands residents that pipes on Colbert Lane would be fixed to address the neighborhood's long-standing flooding issue.
“Two years later, Colbert is not fixed,” she said. “This is not okay; this needs to be fixed.”
The Woodlands butts up against the Graham Swamp trailhead area, which takes stormwater runoff from the canals west of Interstate 95. Water from the west side of I-95 pours into canals and ditches, which eventually lead into Graham Swamp — a basin that collects stormwater — and then empties into the Intracoastal Waterway.
But it’s been several years, and multiple hurricanes, where the Woodlands have flooded from stormwater overflow. And Woodlands residents are wondering what the city is planning to do about it.
Esposito said he called the city’s call center on Thursday, Oct. 10 to ask what the city was doing about the water pouring onto Black Alder Drive. He said he was told there was nothing the city could do at that time but wait. By 10 p.m. that night, he said, the water was at his garage door.
The Graham Swamp basin and surrounding canals and ditches are not enough to hold the stormwater runoff during large rain events, like Hurricane Milton. Palm Coast Communications Director Brittany Kershaw said the Woodlands is the city’s lowest-lying area, so as higher elevations drain into the basin, Graham Swamp will overflow.
“And then it can kind of seep into people's backyards,” Kershaw said. “It's very common for the water to end up there, post storm.”
Palm Coast does have a plan to address the Woodlands problem, though it has been in the works since 2019.
The city plans to upsize existing pipes in Colbert Lane and at Blair Castle. At the Oct. 15 Palm Coast City Council meeting, stormwater engineer Carmelo Morales said that the city has been working to secure all the correct permits for the project with the St. Johns River Water Management District and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection.
At this stage, he said, the project is just waiting on one final permit before it goes out to bid.
“It sounds simple, right? But it really is quite complex,” Morales said. “There are wetland issues, there are environmental issues.”
Replacing the pipes with larger sizes would expand their waterflow capacity and allow for quicker drainage. The pipes would be replaced with larger pipes in three locations: one at Blare Drive and Blare Castle Drive, and two culverts on Colbert Lane.
Two years later, Colbert is not fixed. This is not okay; this needs to be fixed."
— IVETTE ESPOSITO, Woodlands resident
The problem is that the project was stalled for some time. According to the city’s Capital Project dashboard, construction on replacing these pipes was supposed to begin in November 2020 and complete by May 2023.
But though the project’s design and permitting phase is almost complete, the city will still need to secure funding before construction begins. The Capital Project dashboard estimates the project will cost $6.6 million to complete.
Morales said the city is trying to go for a grant that could help pay for the project, though that could also delay construction even further as the city waits for the funding to become available.
“I'm talking about maybe a year before that money becomes available,” Morales said. And that is if the city is even picked for the project. The quicker way to begin construction once the final permit is received would be to use a loan the city is already considering for stormwater improvements and equipment.
“As design goes, we're done,” Morales said. “We know what we need to get done there. It's just other little things that just are in the way.”
Acting City Manager Lauren Johnston said the grant Morales mentioned is one the city has applied to before for this project but has been turned down for in the past. The grant is through the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s hazard mitigation program.
Unfortunately, Johnston said, the city competes against projects state-wide and the pipe upsizing project in the Woodlands ranks much lower than other projects.
“We have had this project on the list for a long time, and there's been other projects that have outranked us,” Johnston said.
In the meantime, Woodland residents like the Espositos were also left to wonder why their neighborhood was not evacuated during the storm.
Though evacuation orders were issued for the Woodlands during Hurricanes Irma and Nicole, no evacuation order was issued for the Woodlands during Hurricane Milton.
I said in my text, ‘David, can you help us save our house?’ Because we were at a point of desperation.”
— RALPH ESPOSITO, Woodlands resident
Kershaw said that is because during the storm, there was never a point where the Woodlands, during Milton, met the threshold for emergency evacuations. Even in the days following the storm, she said, Palm Coast and Flagler County Emergency Management were closely monitoring the neighborhood to ensure an evacuation order wouldn’t be needed as water in the neighborhoods rose.
“It never got to that point where we needed to evacuate [that area],” she said.
The water did continue to rise in the days after Hurricane Milton. By Friday, Oct. 11, the bend of Black Alder Drive was completely submerged in water and entirely impassable.
The Esposito’s home was an island, Ralph Esposito said, between the canal behind their home overflowing and the road flooding all the way up to their garage.
Afraid for their home, he said, he and his wife and sons attempted move as much of their belongings off the ground in case water came into the home.
“We just literally held each other and cried,” Ivette Esposito said. “Because we knew that it [the water] was going to come in.”
Thankfully, no water came inside the home, though it did go into their garage, Ralph Esposito said. Eventually, he said, he called Palm Coast Mayor David Alfin about the rising water, because he felt no one at the city was listening.
“I sent him pictures, and I said in my text, ‘David, can you help us save our house?’ Because we were at a point of desperation,” he said.
The Palm Coast Fire Department then came out and delivered sandbags to the Espositos and other residents, and later returned with several deliveries of ice, as the Woodlands area was also without power for several days after the hurricane.
We can only prepare so much. We need the city to work with us, and we can't just keep being ignored.”
— IVETTE ESPOSITO, Woodlands resident
That Saturday, pumper trucks were on Black Alder Drive, sucking up the water, and by Sunday, Oct. 13, the street was completely clear of water once more.
“It was unreal, the difference,” Kershaw said. “It was night and day.”
Kershaw said that while the pipe replacement project is still in the works alongside other stormwater projects, Palm Coast is working on other ways to track where water will go during a storm. The city is looking into a software that would be integrated into the stormwater system with the historical data and then make predictions on where and how much stormwater will be in an area during a storm, she said.
But Ivette Esposito said the city needs prioritizing solving these issues as Florida gets more and more storms.
“We can only prepare so much,” she said. “We need the city to work with us, and we can't just keep being ignored.”
