Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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trnwatcher
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Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by trnwatcher »

Anyone hearing if CSX has plans on putting weight on the bridge at Market St? Hearing from the City of GR that they staff on flood watch OT for the next few days. River supposedly came up 4 feet since last night. Already cresting above flood stage in Comstock Park. Tenants of DT buildings along the Grand have been warned about possible flooding as well.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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Speaking of flooding on the Grand, up in Lansing I noticed from the mayor's aerials that the CN bridge over the Red Cedar near Potter Park may be underwater by tomorrow; I imagine this means that JAIL's bridge just a few blocks away might also be under. Any news on CN or JAIL stopping service?

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by Stinger4me »

The Grand River is up 10 ft., since Feb. 19, 2018 per USGS data. Rivers appears to be rising.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by chapmaja »

Per MLive article CSX is not planning on weighting the bridge.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

If 196 is basically a levee between the Grand River and Wyoming/Grandville, can someone please explain to me why large areas of Grandville are flooded right now? How did the water get from the Grand to the other side of 196? Specifically the area within the red. This same area was badly flooded in 2013 by the Grand as well.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by trnwatcher »

J T wrote:If 196 is basically a levee between the Grand River and Wyoming/Grandville, can someone please explain to me why large areas of Grandville are flooded right now? How did the water get from the Grand to the other side of 196? Specifically the area within the red. This same area was badly flooded in 2013 by the Grand as well.
Screen Shot 2018-02-24 at 11.14.36 AM.jpg
I was told by an ex City of Grandville employee that when Grandville floods like this the water backs up in the sewers because it is the lowest spot hence the waste water treatment plant just beyond 196.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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This may partially explain why. Also if the sewage system is a combined sanitary and storm sewer, it was probably overworked.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by Saturnalia »

Not only is the 196 embankment full of holes, I'm sure it wasn't designed to be a levee and probably leaks...a lot.

Levees aren't just dirt, they're usually planned out with different substrates for strength and impermeability.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

Actually, I’m fairly confident that close to 100% of the flooding is coming from the Kent Trails path under the highway. Why no one has thought to dump a truckload or two of sand where it passes under the highway is baffling to me. If I were one of the business owners suffering a big loss from the floods, I’d be beyond pissed. Same thing happened in 2013. Much of the flood waters in that area could have been contained with the path of the water being blocked on the bike path by either a pile of
sand or sand bags.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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J T wrote:Actually, I’m fairly confident that close to 100% of the flooding is coming from the Kent Trails path under the highway. Why no one has thought to dump a truckload or two of sand where it passes under the highway is baffling to me. If I were one of the business owners suffering a big loss from the floods, I’d be beyond pissed. Same thing happened in 2013. Much of the flood waters in that area could have been contained with the path of the water being blocked on the bike path by either a pile of
sand or sand bags.
I can't feel for them too much for existing in a flood plain. The Grand has a long history of major floods. If they don't want to deal with flooding then move to higher ground or pay to put flood walls up around your property. Saturn's right about I-196 not being a flood protection structure, it's just a highway.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by MiddleMI »

Lansing has a similar area (Urbandale) in the floodplain; they kept it mostly dry this time by putting up dams at the west end of Kalamazoo street going under US-127. It ended up ushing the river back into Lansing Township/East Lansing, but it saved a much larger area from flooding.

Image

You can see parts of Urbandale did get inundated, but it could have been much, much worse. Lansing's been pretty smart in that it's been buying up lots as they've become empty in their section of Urbandale (the section pictured here is in the township) and other places in the floodplain letting them revert back to nature. This entire area is directly in the floodplain.

Image

It appears the CSX and CN tracks have been built high enough this time, but another foot or so of water and even they would have been swamped. It was really looking bad for CN around the zoo for a minute, though.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

I'm a Lansing native and I have never heard the word "Urbandale" referred to anything there. I've been on every one of those streets in that photo a million times in my life too.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by Raildudes dad »

Buck Creek and Plaster Creek enter the Grand in this area. The river backs up the creeks. Plus the soils from Market Street to Grandville and beyond (Jenison) is all gravel. Those "lakes" are all old gravel pits. You can plug all the "holes" you want but it won't make much difference.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

Raildudes dad wrote:Buck Creek and Plaster Creek enter the Grand in this area. The river backs up the creeks. Plus the soils from Market Street to Grandville and beyond (Jenison) is all gravel. Those "lakes" are all old gravel pits. You can plug all the "holes" you want but it won't make much difference.
Yup, that's why streets in downtown Grandville are flooded right now. Buck Creek did it in 2013 as well. Drove down Judd this morning and saw the water flooded from Plaster Creek. Not as bad as 2013, but still plenty of water in that area.

But then you have the area circled in red in my map pic above, which is affected by neither Buck or Plaster, but rather by this:
Screen Shot 2018-02-25 at 11.27.31 PM.jpg
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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And...
Screen Shot 2018-02-25 at 11.27.44 PM.jpg
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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The drainage system USUALLY works to drain Grandville INTO the Grand. As it rises it goes BACKWARDS thru the same drainage system. Also goes back up the creeks into Grandville.
Now if you could STOP that from happening one must assume they would have done it a long time ago?
So in summation...you can't stop the flood, you live WITH the flood. Always been that way and will always be that way. Come up with a cheap alternative and you will be KING!
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

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J T wrote:And...
Screen Shot 2018-02-25 at 11.27.44 PM.jpg
The bridge for the trail certainly makes it easier for the water to get there. But watch the water level in those gravel pits when the trail doesn't flood. The water level in the pits goes up and down with the river level. Wyoming Park and Grandville are both underlain with nice porous gravel and sand deposits. I think someday it will be profitable`to tear down the houses, mine the gravel in certain parts of Wyoming Park and redevelop with nice condo's around the lake created.

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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

Doktor No wrote:The drainage system USUALLY works to drain Grandville INTO the Grand. As it rises it goes BACKWARDS thru the same drainage system. Also goes back up the creeks into Grandville.
Now if you could STOP that from happening one must assume they would have done it a long time ago?
So in summation...you can't stop the flood, you live WITH the flood. Always been that way and will always be that way. Come up with a cheap alternative and you will be KING!
Dok, there are two different areas of flooding in Grandville that are not flooded from the same source. West of Wilson is flooded from Buck Creek backing up (which you are referring to), and north and east of 28th and Sandford (circled in red in my map image above) is due in part to all the water coming under the highway via the Kent Trails underpass (as seen in my photos). Why they have done nothing to stop water from the Grand River coming under 196 at that point is baffling to me.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by J T »

Raildudes dad wrote: The bridge for the trail certainly makes it easier for the water to get there. But watch the water level in those gravel pits when the trail doesn't flood. The water level in the pits goes up and down with the river level. Wyoming Park and Grandville are both underlain with nice porous gravel and sand deposits. I think someday it will be profitable`to tear down the houses, mine the gravel in certain parts of Wyoming Park and redevelop with nice condo's around the lake created.
And in the meantime, dump a few truckloads of sand on Kent Trails to keep 10' of river water flowing from one side of the highway to the other.
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Re: Flood Planning in Grand Rapids

Unread post by Doktor No »

Well JT, approach the good burghers of Grandville and the Kent County Drain commissioner with your wonderful plan. They will erect a statue of you on Wilson Ave.
If the river rises a certain amount NOTHING will stop it. The water from Buck Creek had already came and went. That flushes out right at the beginning of the event for the most part. The water from UPSTREAM, as in the lower watershed down to Jackson is what came down to inundate the system.
Not stoppable, not today, next week or next year.
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