This vacant lot is turning into a park designed to protect the neighborhood from flooding

Until recently, a vacant lot on a street in North Miami held an ordinary single-family home. But after it flooded repeatedly, and as sea-level rise continues to make flooding even more common in the area, the city decided to use a grant to buy the land. The site will soon become a community space that doubles as a place for stormwater management, helping keep other houses on the block dry and creating a model that could be used in other neighborhoods. [Image: courtesy Department Design Office] “The city of North Miami, like many cities across the United States, is really grappling with this issue of what to do with homes and properties that are repeatedly flooded,” says Kokei Otosi, a project manager at Van Alen Institute , a design nonprofit that partnered with the city on a competition to redesign the lot as part of a larger project to find new solutions for climate resilience in the Miami area. “Dealing with those challenges when people are occupying those spaces means a drain on flood insurance and means rerouting resources from areas of need to restore these homes. . . . So the city is really trying to think proactively […]

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