I’m a student climate activist in NYC. The fight is local, and it’s personal.
A summer storm in New York City again proved how unprepared our neighborhoods are for intense rainfall and other climate-induced extreme weather. In Washington Heights, where I live, there were pools of water at crosswalks with nowhere to drain. When I finished work on July 18 and returned to our basement apartment at around 5 p.m., my mother was emptying the water seeping into our entrance. She’d been at it for almost three hours.
I waited outside until the water drained enough and I could jump over the steps to get inside my home. I’m used to it. Our house floods almost every time we have a massive storm. Hurricanes and tropical storms are the worst, but even a heavy rainstorm, like the one last month, brings pools of water to my home, and elsewhere throughout Northern Manhattan.
As climate change causes increasing and irreversible damage to communities like Washington Heights, what are families like mine supposed to do? Just get used to it and hope the next storm isn’t as strong? Due to poor sanitation management in some areas of the city, trash and debris are more likely to pile up on the streets, which can strain the city’s sewage system during storms. Furthermore, bacteria from waste can enter runoff water and impact the health and well-being of our local ecosystems, vegetation and residents.