What would you do in a city that’s rife with rising sea level problems? Build tunnels of course….

Seeing that South Florida, more specifically Miami, is built on what should likely be natural Everglades, how would this work? Elon Musk has proposed digging car tunnels under Miami to help mitigate the added pressure of an infrastructure shortage, rising pollution and unbearable traffic. But is this the answer?

https://www.curbed.com/2021/01/elon-musk-miami-tunnel-boring-company.html

It seems like the musings of an unregulated blowhard

https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-luxury-real-estate-market-home-sales-sea-levels-underwater-2019-3

Rather than trying to bait cities with false hopes of quickie solutions, and becoming the next Tech Utopia (I think we tried this failed idea in Austin too circa 1999. Remember the “nerd bird” flights from ATX - SJC?), we could concentrate on becoming a city of climate and alt energy solutions. We have fantastic natural resources here in South Florida, well worth saving. We have an abundance of wind, sun and rain — how is it that we also have a dying and decaying Biscayne Bay due to poor planning, sewage leaks and an unfiltered rainwater system? We also have rising sea levels that have rendered the Venetian Islands without anything except raw land value (to raze and rebuild multi-million $ homes 12+ ft above ground level to combat rising tides).

This to me, seems like an opportunity. But just because opportunities can be good for the environment does not make them mutually exclusive from being profitable or jobs driven. In a state where electric and hybrid vehicles are discouraged (and even regulated against), it seems we have an opportunity. By turning our future away from oil and gas and looking towards renewable resources, creating clever solutions for rising sea level, dying seagrass and diminished ecosystems, it seems the opportunities for Miami and South Florida would be endless. It would require brave leadership to embrace new thinking and science. It would require leaders who don’t want to continue enriching their old money friends. It would involve leadership that would be forward thinking, innovative and open to welcoming a new type of wealth. THAT seems like a better industry for South Florida to hedge its bets on.

And the alternative? I guess we can be proud of congested highways, fish kills, bird kills, bacteria filled waters that are rendered unswimmable due to sewage, beaches covered in red-tide and trash, a naked city, pollution, flooding and submerged multi million dollar homes. We don’t have to let just one corporate narcissist launch stupid solutions for complex problems, we can allow innovation, new leadership, science and clever civil engineering set the tone of the day.