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Kingwood flooding doesn't pass the smell test

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SandAG
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9:10a, 9/6/17
SJRA oversees the San Jacinto watershed.
HCFCD oversees the Buffalo Bayou watershed; and it's not a flood plain administrator for the entire county. That should be handled at the municipal level.

They each report to municipal and county administrators. If there was a breakdown in communications below that I can't tell you; but that's not their responsibility.

What type of communication would you like to have with one another? I don't think that either watershed flooded into the other; even though that has happened in the past in other Texas locations - before man-made lakes were created.
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txags92
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In reply to aTm2004 • 9:15a, 9/6/17
AG
aTm2004 said:
Quote:
I can't help you if you decided to go toy shopping during a ****ing hurricane.
You really can't understand what you read, can you? Getting out during what was then a TS with mostly rain was not a hurricane at the time), is a very minor fact in what I've been saying was an overall lack of communication on the part of SJRA or any leadership within Montgomery County. People around Barker and Addicks were told what was anticipated to flood and when it was estimated to happen. You say it was communicated, but I have yet to run into 1 person in Kingwood who was flooded or not, who heard anything about the potential impact downstream. It was communicated that Conroe opened the flood gates, but that was about it.

You state that Conroe was a small percentage of all that went into LH, so why was there not any representatives from SJRA giving updates to the public? Linder, ACOE, and Turner were on multiple times per day giving updates, anticipated impact, etc. Nada from SJRA, and that is what is frustrating to people. Bag may believe that there's some conspiracy going on (I'm not one of them and have not personally met anybody who does), but a large majority don't. I don't remember what happened in Kingwood in '94, but if it was something similar, you can't get angry at people for asking questions when it looks like nothing was learned from it.

Before you go on another rant about a "****ing toy store," people aren't oblivious that this was a historical rain event where flooding was bound to happen. It's the lack of communication on the impact. If the SJRA didn't know what the impact would be and to what areas, that's a major concern that needs to be addressed ASAP.

You also mention the alerts people got on their phones. I got flood alerts all the time, yet I could walk out in my street in flip flops the whole time and not step in a puddle deep enough to get my feet wet. You seem to think that general communication is enough, which it isn't. They way you're defending them makes me wonder where you work.
I have covered this already. USACE was able to give you that information about Addicks and Barker for 2 reasons...1 - they had DAYS to anticipate the reservoirs reaching their spillways and to publicize the need to open their gates before that happened. SJRA had HOURS to make their decision. And 2 - the areas upstream of Barker and Addicks have all been studied and surveyed for years, and USACE has data going all the way back to when they argued against the subdivisions being built to tell them who might flood and who won't. Notice that they did not have the same info and specifics about the downstream flooding. That goes back to the hydrologic modeling is extremely difficult in multi-watershed flood situations. Knowing how much water is coming down each watershed and at what speed and elevation is critical. None of the watersheds downstream of Conroe, Addicks, or Barker had the level of data density available to make a meaningful model of what impact their releases would have downstream. That is why you kept seeing Lindner say "we don't know what is going to happen downstream, but we don't think places beyond those already flooded will be impacted". And he was wrong. They started out trying a lower flow rate, and it didn't slow the reservoir rise quickly enough, so they went higher until it did. Eventually, that combined with the uncontrolled releases started the bayou rising and flooded additional homes. On the San Jacinto, they started with smaller releases too, but they had a much smaller window to experiment with and had to do what they did to protect the dam. There just want time for them to do what you saw done with Addicks and Barker because Conroe is not a flood control reservoir with dozens of feet of freeboard to fill.
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aTm2004
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In reply to SandAG • 9:19a, 9/6/17
AG
SandAG said:
SJRA oversees the San Jacinto watershed.
HCFCD oversees the Buffalo Bayou watershed; and it's not a flood plain administrator for the entire county. That should be handled at the municipal level.

They each report to municipal and county administrators. If there was a breakdown in communications below that I can't tell you; but that's not their responsibility.

What type of communication would you like to have with one another? I don't think that either watershed flooded into the other; even though that has happened in the past in other Texas locations - before man-made lakes were created.
That's what people are questioning, but apparently, doing so gets you piled on and talked to like you're stupid.

I understand the difference between SJRA and HCFCD...one was front and center regarding their moves and potential impact while the other wasn't. That's the rub for many and why they have questions. Some on here are OK with things the way they are and chalk it up to historical rains, rather than see if and where failures were and what can be done in the future...you know, improve since some are saying this is similar to '94.

What kind of communication would many like to see? That's already been answered in my previous post...something similar to what HCFCD did by calling out potential impacted areas and the estimated time of impact. It allowed for people to prepare and to get out. If SJRA didn't know this, then there's a much bigger problem that needs to be addressed.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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aTm2004
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In reply to txags92 • 9:25a, 9/6/17
AG
txags92 said:
aTm2004 said:
Quote:
I can't help you if you decided to go toy shopping during a ****ing hurricane.
You really can't understand what you read, can you? Getting out during what was then a TS with mostly rain was not a hurricane at the time), is a very minor fact in what I've been saying was an overall lack of communication on the part of SJRA or any leadership within Montgomery County. People around Barker and Addicks were told what was anticipated to flood and when it was estimated to happen. You say it was communicated, but I have yet to run into 1 person in Kingwood who was flooded or not, who heard anything about the potential impact downstream. It was communicated that Conroe opened the flood gates, but that was about it.

You state that Conroe was a small percentage of all that went into LH, so why was there not any representatives from SJRA giving updates to the public? Linder, ACOE, and Turner were on multiple times per day giving updates, anticipated impact, etc. Nada from SJRA, and that is what is frustrating to people. Bag may believe that there's some conspiracy going on (I'm not one of them and have not personally met anybody who does), but a large majority don't. I don't remember what happened in Kingwood in '94, but if it was something similar, you can't get angry at people for asking questions when it looks like nothing was learned from it.

Before you go on another rant about a "****ing toy store," people aren't oblivious that this was a historical rain event where flooding was bound to happen. It's the lack of communication on the impact. If the SJRA didn't know what the impact would be and to what areas, that's a major concern that needs to be addressed ASAP.

You also mention the alerts people got on their phones. I got flood alerts all the time, yet I could walk out in my street in flip flops the whole time and not step in a puddle deep enough to get my feet wet. You seem to think that general communication is enough, which it isn't. They way you're defending them makes me wonder where you work.
I have covered this already. USACE was able to give you that information about Addicks and Barker for 2 reasons...1 - they had DAYS to anticipate the reservoirs reaching their spillways and to publicize the need to open their gates before that happened. SJRA had HOURS to make their decision. And 2 - the areas upstream of Barker and Addicks have all been studied and surveyed for years, and USACE has data going all the way back to when they argued against the subdivisions being built to tell them who might flood and who won't. Notice that they did not have the same info and specifics about the downstream flooding. That goes back to the hydrologic modeling is extremely difficult in multi-watershed flood situations. Knowing how much water is coming down each watershed and at what speed and elevation is critical. None of the watersheds downstream of Conroe, Addicks, or Barker had the level of data density available to make a meaningful model of what impact their releases would have downstream. That is why you kept seeing Lindner say "we don't know what is going to happen downstream, but we don't think places beyond those already flooded will be impacted". And he was wrong. They started out trying a lower flow rate, and it didn't slow the reservoir rise quickly enough, so they went higher until it did. Eventually, that combined with the uncontrolled releases started the bayou rising and flooded additional homes. On the San Jacinto, they started with smaller releases too, but they had a much smaller window to experiment with and had to do what they did to protect the dam. There just want time for them to do what you saw done with Addicks and Barker because Conroe is not a flood control reservoir with dozens of feet of freeboard to fill.
So, what you're saying is that since Conroe is not a flood control reservoir, the rain amounts, upstream and downstream flows, flood impact areas, etc doesn't need to be known? I will wholeheartedly disagree with that. No matter what your purpose for water control is, you have to know the impacts of your decisions.

Also, why did one have days and the other have hours?
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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CDUB98
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9:42a, 9/6/17
AG
The simple fact is that there are some people who cannot grasp the complexities of the situation.

No matter how many facts and logic you throw at them, they either choose to remain willfully ignorant, or their brain does not function in a way that makes it possible for them to grasp.
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FHKChE07
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9:46a, 9/6/17
AG
It wasn't just the toy shopping but the number of people that were out on Saturday night for the fight or drinking or whatever after the city and county and surrounding counties gave multiple shelter in places warnings due to high risk of catastrophic flooding. I was just trying to address that people were not making good decisions about what was necessary travel if you were leaving Monday during the height of the flooding in the entire region. I got tired of the traffic ladies repeating over and over every 5 minutes that you should not leave your house and drive anywhere unless it is a complete emergency because I could not fathom why anyone would go out in the torrential weather and catastrophic flooding especially after we had several recent floods. On Monday at noon, Houston was effectively an island because all of the major arteries were underwater.

I don't know about the SJRA releasing information as I don't get those notifications, but I distinctly remember in several of Jeff's Press conferences addressing that with the historically high rates in Lake, Spring and Cypress Creek as well as the releases from Lake Conroe that we were going to see significant flooding in the West Fork of the San Jacinto and the main portion of the San Jacinto because he went on to elaborate about the scouring that happened in the 1994 flood that caused a pipeline rupture and the river caught on fire and how they hope not to repeat that. I have text messages to my brother because I was explaining what happened in 1994 because we were watching the press conference at the same time.

The releases from Lake Conroe at the peak of 79,000 cfs while the peak inflows to Lake Houston from the West Fork were about 236,000 cfs. So yes, relatively, those releases were a minor part (33%) of the inflows that flooded Kingwood. Yes it contributed but considering it could have been 130,000 cfs out of 287000 cfs had there been no dam, the river would have been significantly higher.

You can say that they didn't learn from 1994, but I don't know what you expected them to learn. There was no feasible way to draw down an appreciable amount of water from Lake Conroe in time even if they wanted to regardless of the fact that the dam is not designed for flood control. They tried as much as they could to reduce the rates leaving conroe but they have to protect the integrity of the dam which can only rise a certain height before a catastrophic failure of the spillway gates.

As for the alerts on the phone, I can't help you if you ignore the emergency alerts, but all the news and Jeff in all of his early press conferences were talking about how they invented a never before used level of flooding alert called Catastrophic Flood Alert and activated for several days not just the amber alert level of flood warning by a Civil Emergency Water because of this once in a lifetime event. My facebook was full of all my friends who spent hours in their closets with their children because they were under near constant tornado warnings. I know that a lot of people turn off the alerts on their phones and that is your choice, but then you can't complain that you did not get a warning. If you had a cable TV on, it was constantly popping up on that regardless of whether you were watching the news. They notified people. They can't help if people ignored there warnings, but don't say you weren't warned.

As for where I work, I am just an engineer who takes an interest in weather and could not leave my house through the storm. I have nothing invested in the alert system, but I do generally listen when there are 50 alerts hitting my phone a day that maybe I should pay attention.

Also, I found more information from the SJRA that will address much of what I said above and it is from them.
http://www.sjra.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/FAQs-Related-to-Harvey-and-Lake-Conroe-Dam.pdf
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aTm2004
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In reply to CDUB98 • 9:47a, 9/6/17
AG
CDUB98 said:
The simple fact is that there are some people who cannot grasp the complexities of the situation.

No matter how many facts and logic you throw at them, they either choose to remain willfully ignorant, or their brain does not function in a way that makes it possible for them to grasp.
I guess that's a swipe at me. Why not just say it instead of trying to be cute? You think I'm dumb. Got it.

I'll ask you in my simpleton way since I can't grasp facts and logic...please, answer like you're talking to a 3rd grader since I'm dumb.

1. Do you believe that the SJRA had an idea of the impact downstream for everything they are responsible for?
2. Do you believe that the communication from SJRA to the public was sufficient?
3. Do you believe that the SJRA did everything correctly and could not have done anything differently?
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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CDUB98
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In reply to aTm2004 • 9:49a, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
I guess that's a swipe at me.


No.
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txags92
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In reply to aTm2004 • 9:56a, 9/6/17
AG
aTm2004 said:
txags92 said:
aTm2004 said:
Quote:
KI can't help you if you decided to go toy shopping during a ****ing hurricane.
You really can't understand what you read, can you? Getting out during what was then a TS with mostly rain was not a hurricane at the time), is a very minor fact in what I've been saying was an overall lack of communication on the part of SJRA or any leadership within Montgomery County. People around Barker and Addicks were told what was anticipated to flood and when it was estimated to happen. You say it was communicated, but I have yet to run into 1 person in Kingwood who was flooded or not, who heard anything about the potential impact downstream. It was communicated that Conroe opened the flood gates, but that was about it.

You state that Conroe was a small percentage of all that went into LH, so why was there not any representatives from SJRA giving updates to the public? Linder, ACOE, and Turner were on multiple times per day giving updates, anticipated impact, etc. Nada from SJRA, and that is what is frustrating to people. Bag may believe that there's some conspiracy going on (I'm not one of them and have not personally met anybody who does), but a large majority don't. I don't remember what happened in Kingwood in '94, but if it was something similar, you can't get angry at people for asking questions when it looks like nothing was learned from it.

Before you go on another rant about a "****ing toy store," people aren't oblivious that this was a historical rain event where flooding was bound to happen. It's the lack of communication on the impact. If the SJRA didn't know what the impact would be and to what areas, that's a major concern that needs to be addressed ASAP.

You also mention the alerts people got on their phones. I got flood alerts all the time, yet I could walk out in my street in flip flops the whole time and not step in a puddle deep enough to get my feet wet. You seem to think that general communication is enough, which it isn't. They way you're defending them makes me wonder where you work.
I have covered this already. USACE was able to give you that information about Addicks and Barker for 2 reasons...1 - they had DAYS to anticipate the reservoirs reaching their spillways and to publicize the need to open their gates before that happened. SJRA had HOURS to make their decision. And 2 - the areas upstream of Barker and Addicks have all been studied and surveyed for years, and USACE has data going all the way back to when they argued against the subdivisions being built to tell them who might flood and who won't. Notice that they did not have the same info and specifics about the downstream flooding. That goes back to the hydrologic modeling is extremely difficult in multi-watershed flood situations. Knowing how much water is coming down each watershed and at what speed and elevation is critical. None of the watersheds downstream of Conroe, Addicks, or Barker had the level of data density available to make a meaningful model of what impact their releases would have downstream. That is why you kept seeing Lindner say "we don't know what is going to happen downstream, but we don't think places beyond those already flooded will be impacted". And he was wrong. They started out trying a lower flow rate, and it didn't slow the reservoir rise quickly enough, so they went higher until it did. Eventually, that combined with the uncontrolled releases started the bayou rising and flooded additional homes. On the San Jacinto, they started with smaller releases too, but they had a much smaller window to experiment with and had to do what they did to protect the dam. There just want time for them to do what you saw done with Addicks and Barker because Conroe is not a flood control reservoir with dozens of feet of freeboard to fill.
So, what you're saying is that since Conroe is not a flood control reservoir, the rain amounts, upstream and downstream flows, flood impact areas, etc doesn't need to be known? I will wholeheartedly disagree with that. No matter what your purpose for water control is, you have to know the impacts of your decisions.

Also, why did one have days and the other have hours?
Dude, seriously? You complain about people treating you like you are stupid, but then you ask questions like that that have been explained a dozen times on the thread already. You are mixing up two completely separate storylines with your question above. What Conroe not being a flood control reservoir means is that the lake is not designed to have dozens of feet of freeboard space that they can fill with water during a flood event without needing to release water. They have at most about 6 feet over the normal pool height, or maybe even less before they start risking the safety of the dam. So when heavy rains start, and their water level starts rising, they have a few hours up to maybe a day to review the data coming in and decide whether they are going to have to release. They don't have time in that situation for detailed modeling, they have to decide with what they know at that moment in time, and the number 1, red line rule at Conroe that overrules all other considerations is PROTECT THE DAM! If they lose sight of that rule and allow the rising waters to get too far ahead of their releases, then you risk seeing a flood that makes Harvey look like child's play in Kingwood. So that is about flood control reservoirs...got it? Conroe has a few feet of freeboard...hours to make a decision; Addicks and Barker were designed to control floods and have something like 40-50 feet of freeboard, and the closer they get to full, the slower they rise because the flooded area increases, which usually gives them days or even a week to see a need to release coming and plenty of time to provide notice.

So, the second part of your question is about knowing what will flood. Knowing what will flood upstream of.a dam is extremely easy to do and I guarantee that SJRA knows exactly what will flood when Lake Conroe gets to X feet in height, just like they showed for Addicks and Barker. But Kingwood is not upstream of the dam, it is downstream, with at least 3 other major watersheds merging with the flow from Conroe before reaching Kingwood. They only way to truly know what will flood in a given flow rate is from previous storm information...and we had never had a storm with flows like this. You can easily model flow from a single dam release point down a single channel and get a decent idea what the water level will be for a given release rate. But as soon as you add in other watersheds flowing at historical flood levels, and water flowing outside of the channels, the modeling becomes extremely complicated and very prone to significant error if the data and assumptions input into the model doesn't match the actual conditions. So at both Conroe and the USACE structures, you had releases at rates that had never been done before; you had releases into watersheds impacted by multiple other watersheds entering the flow; you had water in the watershed below the release point already out of the channel and flowing through unknown terrain and flow velocity conditions; and you had at most a couple of elevation gauges on each watershed to give you an idea of how much water might be coming through.

That is an impossible modeling situation. To accurately model the flow and understand what could happen downstream in an out of bank flow environment, you would need hundreds of gauge inputs and accurate flow velocity measurements both in the channel and outside the banks in the neighborhoods. You would need a team of modelers and a supercomputer to crunch all the data together fast enough, and it still would take many hours to run the model and probably days to get enough confidence in the model to make a forecast prediction based on it. SJRA had HOURS, not days to make a decision. It doesn't matter how much you research and study the area before the storm hits, it is the water flows during the storm that determine how the watershed rises and falls and you can't start modeling that until you get the data as the storm is happening. Even with days to study the issue and model possibilities, HCFCD and USACE got it wrong downstream of their dams and they are getting sued because of it. SJRA had HOURS to make a decision, and nowhere near the data density or modeling capability they needed to produce the kinds of predictions you are asking for. What you are asking for can only be done looking backward at similar historic storms because we know what flooded in past situations with similar flows. We had no similar previous storms, because this was the worst ever. They told us everything that they could...that the releases were record level, above 1994, and Kingwood was expected to get historic flooding.
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aTm2004
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In reply to FHKChE07 • 9:59a, 9/6/17
AG
We'll never be on the same page because you're of the belief that what little communication there was was sufficient, and that people impacted were only impacted because they chose to ignore general alerts, while watching significant coverage and information being passed onto the public for other impacted areas.

We all saw several visuals and constant communication about Addicks and Barker releases, and barely nothing on the San Jac. Why do you think that is? Is it because they don't know, or didn't have the information needed? If that is the case, are you OK with that? People questioning it will hopefully get answers and possibly help prevent something similar in the future? Does that mean that nobody will flood? No.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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aTm2004
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In reply to txags92 • 10:07a, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
Dude, seriously? You complain about people treating you like you are stupid, but then you ask questions like that that have been explained a dozen times on the thread already. You are mixing up two completely separate storylines with your question above. What Conroe not being a flood control reservoir means is that the lake is not designed to have dozens of feet of freeboard space that they can fill with water during a flood event without needing to release water. They have at most about 6 feet over the normal pool height, or maybe even less before they start risking the safety of the dam. So when heavy rains start, and their water level starts rising, they have a few hours up to maybe a day to review the data coming in and decide whether they are going to have to release.
I was on vacation the week prior to Harvey hitting and they were already predicting 20-30+ inches of rain for the Houston area with a storm anticipated to hang around almost a week. If they need to wait for the lake to get to a certain level before putting plans into action, that is a process that needs to be reevaluated, IMO. So, to the first highlighted point, maybe something can be learned from this for the future, don't you think? I do acknowledge that rain totals were beyond what was predicted.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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FHKChE07
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In reply to aTm2004 • 10:08a, 9/6/17
AG
They had days with Addicks and Barker because Addicks and Barker are flood control reservoirs that are kept empty essentially always which allows them to each impound ~200,000 acre-ft of water before they really need to take action. On Barker reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 71.0 ft to 104.00 ft. On Addicks Reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 67.82 ft to 108.00.

Because Lake Conroe, again, is not a FLOOD CONTROL RESERVOIR, the volume of water between normal pool operating level and "OH MY GOD, THE POOL IS TOO HIGH, we have catastrophic failure" is much less. Normal operating pool level for Lake Conroe is 201 ft. They have 6 ft of easement to 207 ft that they are allowed to flood operationally to make sure that they don't overtop the spillway gates causing them to fail. There aren't even capacity curves for anything over 201 ft but the area of Lake Conroe at 201 ft is 19,640 acres, so with 6 ft of easement we can estimate that volume to be, roughly, 117,840 acre ft of water, or around a quarter of the capacity of the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs.

Also, considering that the inflows in the Lake Conroe were significant at 130,000 cfs, that was only ~10 hours of fill time at that rate. Addicks and Barker had roughly 4 times that at a few days.
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aTm2004
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In reply to FHKChE07 • 10:17a, 9/6/17
AG
FHKChE07 said:
They had days with Addicks and Barker because Addicks and Barker are flood control reservoirs that are kept empty essentially always which allows them to each impound ~200,000 acre-ft of water before they really need to take action. On Barker reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 71.0 ft to 104.00 ft. On Addicks Reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 67.82 ft to 108.00.

Because Lake Conroe, again, is not a FLOOD CONTROL RESERVOIR, the volume of water between normal pool operating level and "OH MY GOD, THE POOL IS TOO HIGH, we have catastrophic failure" is much less. Normal operating pool level for Lake Conroe is 201 ft. They have 6 ft of easement to 207 ft that they are allowed to flood operationally to make sure that they don't overtop the spillway gates causing them to fail. There aren't even capacity curves for anything over 201 ft but the area of Lake Conroe at 201 ft is 19,640 acres, so with 6 ft of easement we can estimate that volume to be, roughly, 117,840 acre ft of water, or around a quarter of the capacity of the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs.

Also, considering that the inflows in the Lake Conroe were significant at 130,000 cfs, that was only ~10 hours of fill time at that rate. Addicks and Barker had roughly 4 times that at a few days.
No ***** It doesn't mean that there can't be something learned from this for the future. If there isn't pressure on them for answers, their motivation to make changes will be almost nil.

Again, we're on different pages.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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CDUB98
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10:17a, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
I was on vacation the week prior to Harvey hitting and they were already predicting 20+ inches of rain for the Houston area with a storm anticipated to hang around almost a week.


And if they were wrong?

Then you run the potential of shorting millions of people on water down the line, and a large chunk of Kingwood would still have flooded.
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aTm2004
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In reply to CDUB98 • 10:20a, 9/6/17
AG
CDUB98 said:
Quote:
I was on vacation the week prior to Harvey hitting and they were already predicting 20+ inches of rain for the Houston area with a storm anticipated to hang around almost a week.


And if they were wrong?

Then you run the potential of shorting millions of people on water down the line, and a large chunk of Kingwood would still have flooded.
And there's the rub.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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txags92
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In reply to aTm2004 • 10:21a, 9/6/17
AG
aTm2004 said:
Quote:
Dude, seriously? You complain about people treating you like you are stupid, but then you ask questions like that that have been explained a dozen times on the thread already. You are mixing up two completely separate storylines with your question above. What Conroe not being a flood control reservoir means is that the lake is not designed to have dozens of feet of freeboard space that they can fill with water during a flood event without needing to release water. They have at most about 6 feet over the normal pool height, or maybe even less before they start risking the safety of the dam. So when heavy rains start, and their water level starts rising, they have a few hours up to maybe a day to review the data coming in and decide whether they are going to have to release.
I was on vacation the week prior to Harvey hitting and they were already predicting 20+ inches of rain for the Houston area with a storm anticipated to hang around almost a week. If they need to wait for the lake to get to a certain level before putting plans into action, that is a process that needs to be reevaluated, IMO. So, to the first highlighted point, maybe something can be learned from this for the future, don't you think?
The lake is kept at a certain level because they are a drinking water reservoir and they can't afford to drain the lake every time there might be heavy rain because then there would be no drinking water available when we go into a drought. Also, as has been discussed here many times already, so I guess maybe you just missed it Harvey formed about 4-5 days before it hit, and the predictions for the 35+ inch totals really didn't become more than a distant possibility until about 3 days out. SJRA water takes about 5-7 days to get from Conroe to the gulf, so dumping water for 3 days prior to a predicted deluge would serve only to fill up lake Houston and the San Jac watershed prior to the flood, which would have made things worse. As was said just above this, the process can't be reevaluated...they have to protect the dam...period. That means they have about 6 feet of room to play with and then they have to start releasing at the rate of infill or risk losing the dam. At the rate Conroe was filling, they had about 10 hours before they overtopped the gates. So they had to start releasing ahead of that 10 hours so that they could release at a slower rate. As I explained above, there is simply no time to come up with detailed models of where that flood will reach because every flood is different. And even if the modeling capability was there, the time necessary to complete it isn't.

The only way to change what you are asking about is to completely rebuild Lake Conroe's damn with an extra 30' of height, and to plan to routinely flood out billions of dollars of subdivisions and lake houses around Lake Conroe. That is never going to happen.
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CDUB98
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10:22a, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
If there isn't pressure on them for answers, their motivation to make changes will be almost nil.


1. You're pressing for answers that have already been placed in this thread. Just because they didn't come from the SJRA does not make them incorrect. texag92 looks to have some serious knowledge on the subject in general too.

2. The changes I assume you would like made are not possible given Lake Conroe's design function.

Essentially, you're barking at a stump rather than up a tree.



Public communications is an issue that can be discussed. I was glued to the TV, so I did see several warnings and notifications about Lake Conroe releases, but no, the SJRA was not out in front of everyone every 4-6 hours like Harris County.
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BigPuma
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In reply to aTm2004 • 10:26a, 9/6/17
AG
That means Kingwood might not have had any drinking water if they were wrong.

Additionally as has been said countless times in this thread already, if they had pre-released Conroe, Kingwood would have flooded faster and sooner. Potentially even more. You preload the area where water is going means you flood **** faster.

This coming from a guy that has Cane Island Creek aka northern branch of Buffalo Bayou in his backyard. I saw how much water we took on upstream of Barker.
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txags92
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In reply to aTm2004 • 10:26a, 9/6/17
AG
aTm2004 said:
FHKChE07 said:
They had days with Addicks and Barker because Addicks and Barker are flood control reservoirs that are kept empty essentially always which allows them to each impound ~200,000 acre-ft of water before they really need to take action. On Barker reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 71.0 ft to 104.00 ft. On Addicks Reservoir, that is a change in pool height from 67.82 ft to 108.00.

Because Lake Conroe, again, is not a FLOOD CONTROL RESERVOIR, the volume of water between normal pool operating level and "OH MY GOD, THE POOL IS TOO HIGH, we have catastrophic failure" is much less. Normal operating pool level for Lake Conroe is 201 ft. They have 6 ft of easement to 207 ft that they are allowed to flood operationally to make sure that they don't overtop the spillway gates causing them to fail. There aren't even capacity curves for anything over 201 ft but the area of Lake Conroe at 201 ft is 19,640 acres, so with 6 ft of easement we can estimate that volume to be, roughly, 117,840 acre ft of water, or around a quarter of the capacity of the Addicks and Barker Reservoirs.

Also, considering that the inflows in the Lake Conroe were significant at 130,000 cfs, that was only ~10 hours of fill time at that rate. Addicks and Barker had roughly 4 times that at a few days.
No ***** It doesn't mean that there can't be something learned from this for the future. If there isn't pressure on them for answers, their motivation to make changes will be almost nil.

Again, we're on different pages.
There are no changes they can make in the operations. You either start releasing, or you risk losing the dam. Period. Do you understand at all what that means? Conroe is an earthen dam. Overtopping the gate structure risks eroding the dam and creating massive release that cannot be controlled in anyway. Imagine 5-10x the amount of flow being released due to that kind of failure and you can understand why their operations plan doesn't allow them to even consider that possibility. We are on different pages because you can't seem to accept the reality that they didn't have a choice about whether to release or not.
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FHKChE07
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In reply to aTm2004 • 10:36a, 9/6/17
AG
What you are continuing to misunderstand about Lake Conroe is that it will never be a flood control lake. It is not designed for this. It is meant to be maintained at a relatively constant level in order to maintain supply of drinking water for the City of Houston. If you wanted to drain Lake Conroe prior to this storm a week before to turn Lake Conroe in to a flood control lake that would require full release rates of 150,000 cfs and would have significantly preflooded Lake Houston which would have exacerbated the problems we saw in Kingwood.

From SJRA's website about Lake Conroe:
Quote:
Releasing water before the lake reaches the 201-foot elevation would cause the streambed to fill prematurely. Then, even a very small amount of rain could cause the river to flow out of its banks unnecessarily. The gates, in reality, regulate how much of the water from the 444-square-mile watershed above Lake Conroe enters the streambed and can in many cases minimize the effects of a severe storm. Additionally, pre-releases would need to occur for approximately two weeks to lower the lake level significantly, which is well beyond accurate weather forecasting.

As to notification, I distinctly remember Jeff talking about it during multiple press conferences including ones that I was talking about it with other people. The news talked about it. The SJRA released press releases to the local news stations. There were alerts sent to your phone. The news in the week leading up to the storm and during the 5 days of the storm repeatedly relayed orders from the local officials to stay off the roads and shelter in place. Would you have preferred them to send sheriffs door to door demanding people evacuate in the middle of the night once the water was heading your way? It was a rapidly evolving situation with more and more rain pouring into the watershed beneath the dam. These floods we experienced aren't like the floods on major rivers like the Missouri and the Mississippi, where you can see the floods coming down the river for weeks ahead of time. From Lake Conroe through Lake Houston to the bay is roughly 100 miles. The rain is still occurring as the flooding is moving downstream. This is incredibly hard to model because rain rates change signifcantly.

So when the water released from Lake Conroe (again, to protect the dam), mixed with the water from the other much larger streams that were very high coming in to the West Fork and the water falling from the sky in biblical proportions, catastrophic devastation happened.

It sucks. It really sucks. But if you want me to feel sorry for you because you weren't personally informed that there was going to be historic, catastrophic flooding, I don't know what to say. Jeff talked about it, the news talked about it, your phone gave you multiple levels of alerts including one that bypasses your ability to turn it off, your TV was going off with alerts...

It reminds me of the story of the guy in the flood on his house that was going to pray his way out: God sent him multiple ways of salvation, but he ignored all of them. I don't see how you can blame them for not informing you.
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chimpanzee
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10:43a, 9/6/17
It takes something like this to truly identify where points of failure are in such a complex system.


We are, however, in the blaming stage of this tragedy, so whatever tradeoffs were made (and there were surely thousands) look like conspiracies.

In the end, I have full confidence that people will believe the story that holds them harmless or makes them the victim. Prior to now, building something to handle this storm would have defensibly been seen as a wasteful boondoggle. I'm hopeful that someone without a political axe to grind can come up with some decent alternatives for the future to give us more of a buffer, but I doubt the public has the attention span to see it through without the usual suspects skimming the gravy and quadrupling the cost. .
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FHKChE07
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In reply to txags92 • 10:46a, 9/6/17
AG
If I am not mistaken, his thinking that we are on different pages is that he wants them to reevaluate keeping Lake Conroe at its normal level now as a drinking water reservoir and instead turning Lake Conroe into a flood control lake at a much lower level. The unfortunate problem is that the way the outlet spillway and Dam is designed, is and again I am quoting the SJRA from links above:

Quote:
the soils in the dam below the normal water line of 201' MSL are fully saturated with water, and if the lake level was lowered below 201' MSL too quickly, the reduction of water pressure against the face of the dam could cause instability of the soils on the upstream slope.
So even if they had enough warning, which they can't accurately have and managed to ignore the preflooding of the downstream and didn't care about drinking water, the dam would most likely be damaged during a rapid draw down leading to a failure of the dam.

The only way to turn Lake Conroe into a flood control dam is to rebuild the dam from the ground up as a flood control dam. End of discussion.
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CDUB98
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10:53a, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
Prior to now, building something to handle this storm would have defensibly been seen as a wasteful boondoggle.


And it would still be a boondoggle.

Nobody designs for an 800 year event. You pretty much cannot. Just how much area/drainage acreage do you think it would take to hold back the waters of Niagara Falls for 15 days? (an equivalent I've seen)
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FHKChE07
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11:10a, 9/6/17
AG
Addicks and Barker were designed and implemented in the 40s when they could get 10,000 acres of land when there wasn't any people really west of what would become the West loop. Now you want to build a flood control reservoir in the middle of conroe?
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chimpanzee
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In reply to CDUB98 • 11:14a, 9/6/17
CDUB98 said:
Quote:
Prior to now, building something to handle this storm would have defensibly been seen as a wasteful boondoggle.


And it would still be a boondoggle.

Nobody designs for an 800 year event. You pretty much cannot. Just how much area/drainage acreage do you think it would take to hold back the waters of Niagara Falls for 15 days? (an equivalent I've seen)
I think I agree, just curious what the scope/scale would have to be to make it work. Then we can have the conversation and say, if you want to prevent damage from a similar storm in the future, prepare to pay an additional $X per man, woman and child annually in perpetuity.

Then we will all reasonably conclude that insurance is cheaper than the make-work OPM monument that the solution would turn out to be.

But I am still curious what alternatives may exist.
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Bag
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In reply to The Wonderer • 12:05p, 9/6/17
AG
Thanks for adding to conversation.
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LostInLA07
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In reply to chimpanzee • 12:06p, 9/6/17
AG
The cheapest option would probably be to turn kingwood into a park. You're going to have to acquire a ton a land to hold that much water so might as well take the land that floods and not build any additional flood control structures.
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txags92
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In reply to chimpanzee • 12:07p, 9/6/17
AG
chimpanzee said:
CDUB98 said:
Quote:
Prior to now, building something to handle this storm would have defensibly been seen as a wasteful boondoggle.


And it would still be a boondoggle.

Nobody designs for an 800 year event. You pretty much cannot. Just how much area/drainage acreage do you think it would take to hold back the waters of Niagara Falls for 15 days? (an equivalent I've seen)
I think I agree, just curious what the scope/scale would have to be to make it work. Then we can have the conversation and say, if you want to prevent damage from a similar storm in the future, prepare to pay an additional $X per man, woman and child annually in perpetuity.

Then we will all reasonably conclude that insurance is cheaper than the make-work OPM monument that the solution would turn out to be.

But I am still curious what alternatives may exist.
Well, I would think my rough guess of adding 30' to the height of Lake Conroe as a total WAG would be a starting point to guess at the cost. What would it take to buy every piece of property within 30' vertical elevation of the current Conroe spillway height? I don't have any clue, but I bet you it would be in the tens of billions. Keep in mind that isn't 30 feet from the current shore, but 30' above the current spillway height...so many properties not directly on the lake, including golf courses, country clubs, marinas, highways, etc. would all be potentially underwater and have to be bought out or rebuilt above the new elevations. Lets use a round number of $50 billion to rebuild the dam, rebuild the highways, and buyout all the business and houses. For that cost, you could probably buy every house that flooded due to the Harvey releases in the downstream watershed 3-4 times. To me that makes it a boondoggle. Why pay to protect a few subdivisions against an 800 year storm, when we could pay to rebuild them 3 to 4 times for the same amount of money? Or just buy them out once and refuse to let them rebuild if they take the buyout money unless they raise their slab elevation above a set value to prevent future flooding.
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Bag
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In reply to The Wonderer • 12:15p, 9/6/17
AG
Thanks for the personal attack. Didn't realize we were in middle School
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Bag
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In reply to CDUB98 • 12:19p, 9/6/17
AG
Then to me, I guess I am willfully ignorant.
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BigPuma
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In reply to Bag • 1:21p, 9/6/17
aTm2004
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2:52p, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
There are no changes they can make in the operations.
Quote:
What you are continuing to misunderstand about Lake Conroe is that it will never be a flood control lake. It is not designed for this.
You assume that I'm not understanding that Conroe isn't a flood control lake. I do understand it. I don't know how much more clear I can be or could have been. The bolded is why we keep going back and forth. Your thought seems to be that that's the way it is and always will be. I'm wondering if they can take what they know and make changes so that it can primarily serve as a drinking reservoir while also doing some flood control. Yeah, it won't prevent all flooding, but to not take a look at possible options is a disservice to the citizens they serve. Lake Houston, IIRC from earlier in the thread, is a spillway dam. Could they possibly make some changes to that in order to do some release prior to a big rain event while maintaining it's intended purpose? Maybe they can, maybe they can't. We'll never know if they don't look at it. Could they look at their guidelines or protocols of when to begin releasing in preparation for a storm, and if so, at what point and how much. Also, what can they do as far as bettering their communication in the future? As we all know, communication is key in everything from natural disasters to personal relationships. Several feel that there was no communication. Others feel there was. They'll never satisfy everybody, but that doesn't mean that they can't reevaluate what they did and implement changes for the future.

That's what I'm wondering. I don't need to be told that it's not a flood control lake anymore as that seems to be almost every single post made to what I've said.
ArticPenguin:
I am a middle aged lesbian with two children. In Texas, the GOP would love to claim I am an unfit parent and take my children.

Response when pressed for proof:
I actually have 6 links, and was getting super pissed the more info I looked up...So, look it up yourself, I am not going to fight about something I know to be true, to a person who would just as soon see me in prison or dead.
https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/2948036/replies/51680255
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txags92
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3:27p, 9/6/17
AG
The two functions are diametrically opposed to one another. It is impossible to maximize the available drinking water supply in case of drought, while simultaneously maintaining a large freeboard to allow for it to be used for flood control. You simply can't do both things. If you invented a teleporter so that released water vanished as soon as it left the Conroe gates and reappeared in the gulf, then yes, given 5-7 days warning of a major flood event (which is beyond our current forecast accuracy), they MIGHT be able to gain a foot or two of freeboard which would have taken less than a day to fill at the rate it was entering the Lake during Harvey. Otherwise anything you release from Conroe is just going to prime the downstream watershed for worse flooding given the limitations of our current forecasting capabilities. And keep in mind that the first time they dump a bunch of drinking water for a rainfall that doesn't materialize that is then followed by a drought, they are going to get sued by everybody whose landscaping died due to water restrictions and everybody whose bass boat center punches a stump.

As I said in my previous post, If you want to use it for flood control, build the dam 30 feet higher and buyout all the current owners living near the lake, and rebuild Highway 105 and several other major roads somewhere else. Otherwise, accept that it isn't for flood control and get better in tune with the types of warnings they use to let you know what is coming. Oh, and buy flood insurance.
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CDUB98
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In reply to aTm2004 • 3:31p, 9/6/17
AG
Quote:
I'm wondering if they can take what they know and make changes so that it can primarily serve as a drinking reservoir while also doing some flood control.


No, it's not, and the reasons have been stated multiple times in this thread.
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txags92
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3:32p, 9/6/17
AG
I somewhat agree on communication...but I also recognize a trend that seems to be those who think there wasn't enough communication were out watching the fight or doing other things...while those who think there was plenty of notice that something was happening were the ones staying home and watching news coverage nonstop. In my own experience, I don't trust the news to tell me what I need to know. I have the Harriscountyfws.org website bookmarked, and I was well aware of the elevations of my local creeks, their bank full status, and the rise of the Addicks reservoir near me before the news ever started talking about it. Take the steps necessary to inform yourself, and you will never have to wait for somebody else to warn you of coming flood danger.
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