New York City is sinking under the collective weight of all of its buildings, a new study has found.
This gradual process could spell trouble for a city around which the sea level has been rising more than twice as fast as the global rate — and is projected to rise between 8 inches and 30 inches by 2050. What’s more, scientists expect more frequent and extreme rainfall events such as nor’easters and hurricanes due to the human-fueled climate crisis. “We’re a ways off from the ocean simply moving in,” said lead study author Tom Parsons, a research geophysicist at the US Geological Survey.
“We could see some correspondence where there’s construction on very soft soils and artificial fill,” Parsons said. “Other places, we see subsidence that’s difficult to explain. And there’s a lot of different causes of it, such as post glacial relaxation that happened after the last ice age, or groundwater pumping.” Some areas of lower Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens are among those that are sinking at a faster than average rate, according to the study.
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