A year after record rainfall, Cold Spring still recovering
A year ago, Cold Spring was at the center of a record-breaking storm. As much as 9 inches of rain fell on the night of Sunday, July 9 — the equivalent at a colder time of year to 9 feet of snow.
Flash floods washed away roads and bridges, flooded houses, disrupted transportation and caused millions of dollars in property damage in the region. In Highland Falls, a 30-year-old woman drowned. In Cold Spring, more than 7 inches of rain fell in just a few hours, inundating the drainage system from Cedar to Fair streets.
The village has responded with plans for upgrades to handle the next superstorm. Hahn Engineering has completed the design for a $1.5 million rebuild of a collapsed drain beneath Fair Street. A parking ban remains in effect at Mayor’s Park.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will fund at least 75 percent of the work to replace the 30-inch culvert that failed with two, 42-inch pipes. Work could begin late this year or early in 2025 once permits are approved. Because Fair Street lies within the Hudson River floodplain, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and state Department of Environmental Conservation must OK the plans.
The Fair Street drain flows into the tidal pool at Route 9D which, in turn, empties into the river, the endpoint for stormwater from the 160-acre Back Brook watershed that begins at Bull Hill, some 1,300 feet above Mayor’s Park.
“Topography is the biggest challenge we have,” said Mayor Kathleen Foley, noting that during the 2023 storm, the volume of water that rushed down the mountains and slopes at high speed was simply too much for the infrastructure.
That was evident at Cedar Street, which flooded when the stormwater drain was inundated by water flowing from Bull Hill through the Nelsonville Woods, a situation made worse because the village-owned 18-inch culvert under the street flows into a 10-inch pipe that runs under private property.
While Fair Street is Cold Spring’s first major project in response to the storm, it won’t be the last. Elected officials are racing to find the ways and means to improve a system that, in some cases, dates to the mid-19th century.
It’s a race against global warming. According to the DEC, extreme storms are becoming a greater threat. Between 1958 and 2010, heavy precipitation in the northeastern U.S. rose by more than 70 percent, the largest increase for any region of the country.
The Fair Street project underlines the high cost of upgrading infrastructure. The village has applied for a Hudson River Estuaries Climate Adaptation Study Grant that, if approved, would determine the best options for improving stormwater management throughout the Back Brook watershed.
Related: Storm Repairs Ongoing
Fuss and O’Neill, a firm that specializes in climate adaptability forecasting, will advise the village on proposed modifications to the system. Hahn Engineering’s work delineated the Back Brook watershed and assessed the movement of stormwater within it.
Foley pointed out that most residents don’t realize Back Brook is a single, continuous stream. That’s not surprising because it has been altered many times. It flows beneath Cedar Street and parts of Main Street but is open behind houses on the east side of Garden Street.
Hahn recommended that upgrades be made first at the bottom of the watershed by installing larger culverts; dredging open portions of Back Brook; adding retention areas above Cedar Street to slow the flow from Bull Hill; restoring James Pond and creating new ponds; and expanding wetlands. Runoff which shifted into Back Brook because of more recent storms could be altered to again flow into Foundry Brook.
Such initiatives would require intermunicipal agreements with Nelsonville and Philipstown, as well as input from the DEC, and Foley said the village is researching grants to apply for and prioritizing them by likelihood of success.
“In theory, there’s a lot of money out there from the federal infrastructure fund and from the New York State Environmental Bond Act,” she said, while cautioning that the process is competitive and bringing funds to the local level is not easy, especially with limited staff.
Foley said a range of projects, from repairs to the upper dam (estimated to cost $6 million to $7 million) to stormwater infrastructure upgrades and storm readiness, will need to be funded by grants and bonds. “And it may be taxes at some point,” she said. “Nobody wants to be the person to say that.”
Foley hopes residents will become more involved in stormwater management plans. “Infrastructure is not sexy — it’s not as exciting or as conflictual as parking,” she said, noting that no one attended the May meeting of the Village Board during which Hahn outlined its Fair Street proposal.
That may change with the climate adaptation study, which will include community planning charrettes and public input.
This gets complicated, but to clarify: Fair Street was originally identified as eligible damage by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. However, in March, many months into a detailed review process, FEMA determined that Fair and Main streets are eligible for recovery funds from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), a fact not previously known by the village.
Eligibility for other relief funds disqualifies a municipality for FEMA funding at that location. Therefore, we had to start the review process afresh with the FHWA, quite late in the game. We expect at least 75 percent FHWA funding, but have not yet been given a determination. Nor do we yet know if FHWA will include the entire Fair Street damage area in its award, as FEMA would have done. We hope to have feedback in the coming weeks.
The other “damages” (FEMA parlance) from July 2023 to be determined eligible for FEMA reimbursement are the intersection of Mountain and Fishkill avenues, a portion of the Back Brook streambed between Garden and Church streets, a culvert near Fish Street, the Visitor Center plaza and a portion of the rail underpass tunnel (for which the village has responsibility, rather than Metro-North). Ironically, the Cedar Street culvert did not qualify for FEMA relief. The culvert failed in the storm but was not damaged. That is FEMA’s bar.
Foley is the Cold Spring mayor.