Flooding Is A Major Problem In Amarillo
Coming from Austin, I used to get so frustrated when the heavy rains would come in. They have a ton of these "low water crossings" because of the hilly nature of the region. Every time the heavy rain would come, or just rain for a long period of time, these crossings would close due to flooding.
It was a massive inconvenience because you'd have to look for alternate routes that would easily add on 10-15 minutes to your trip, no matter where you were going. However, now that I've dealt with some Amarillo rain, I can officially say it's FAR worse here than in Austin.
I beat the flooding this morning by getting into work a bit early, but 30 minutes after I got here, I'm seeing pictures of flooding across the city, not to mention the highways. How is it that a city that is so flat, at least in comparison to Austin, can have SO much flooding in such a short period of time?
2 things can cause that. One, the ground is super saturated and just can't handle anymore precipitation. That is a bit of a problem here right now as we've taken on so much rain the last few months, but it shouldn't create a flooding issue THAT fast.
The other thing that can cause this much flooding is poor drainage. This to me is the main problem. As I've driven around in the rain and puddles, I've noticed that the drainage in this city is horrendous. Within 15 minutes of the rain starting to come down a bit heavy, the water is standing still on the roadways. It's not moving or flowing at all. It's just...sitting.
Something HAS to be done about that. There needs to be areas for this water to flow to, some kind of drainage ditch or just some angled edges for to flow off to the side and run downstream somewhere. Never in my life have I seen rain hit the ground and just sit there and essentially have to evaporate to go away.
We should band together and demand that something be done about this. Not only is it a major inconvenience, it's dangerous. People try to drive through it and get stuck. We hydroplane on the roadways and run into other cars, or worse, pedestrians. It's time we take a stand and demand they get to work on the drainage in this beautiful city of ours.