Discovered by the French, bought by the Dutch and exploited by the English, New York has been a beacon of opportunity since its founding in the 17th century. However, the city of skyscrapers suffers from the same evil as the majestic Venice. They both sink. They do it slowly, but without pause. And climate change will not help alleviate the effects of this real threat.
And it is that the city of skyscrapers seems to be leaking and that over the years the mega-city will succumb if measures are not taken.
A study published in the multidisciplinary journal Earth’s Future explains that the collapse of New York is due to two variables, natural and anthropogenic causes. The first are divided in turn into two others. On the one hand, they are related to tectonic causes, due to the same soil where New York is based -clay, silt, gravel and rocks-, in the Hudson River estuary.
On the other hand, in the case of anthropogenic causes, the study specifically addresses those caused by the construction of the urban area of the city. Apparently, the immense weight of all that network of buildings pushes down the economic capital of the United States.
Experts have calculated that the city sinks each year between 1 and 2.1 millimeters due to the pressure caused by the 764 million tons weighing the 1,084,954 buildings in the urban area. The calculations do not include the weight of the vehicles or its 8.4 million inhabitants.
Studies have found that this subsidence is not uniform throughout the city. It all depends on the type of soil on which the buildings are.
Sea level
Among the anthropogenic causes is the urban overweight that embeds New York in the terrain and the unstoppable rise in sea level. This increase is between one and six millimeters per year due to the melting of the polar ice caps and the planet’s glaciers.
While in Venice they are trying to save their centuries-old buildings with super structures under the lagoon, in the case of New York the solution is not so simple. As in other coastal cities, salvation would go through building containment dikes.
Since 1950 the water around New York has risen about 20 centimeters. The last hurricanes that hit the city – the last one was Ida in 2021 – have shown what the future holds if those levees are not built.
Far is the year 1524 when the navigator Giovanni da Verrazzano, in the pay of the French crown, called New Angoulême what is now the island of Manhattan. The $24 paid in 1626 by Peter Minuit, governor of the Dutch West India Company, to the Indians for the island has been more than repaid. Half a century later the land fell into the hands of the English, they renamed it New York.
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