CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — While the Tropics have been fairly quiet for South Texas recently, weather plays one of the biggest factors in the continuous pattern of coastal flooding in our area.
3NEWS spoke with various community residents and leaders about what efforts have been made to temporarily reduce coastal flooding.
"Just the problem of getting home," resident Mayra Halm said. "Especially in the evening and it's all flooded and there is no other way to get to our homes here on these first couple of streets at Lighthouse Point."
North Beach business owners are also becoming more and more restless with the continuous flooding.
Lisa Carmickle, owner of the Blue Marlin Saloon and George Gonzales owner of the Electric Cobra, are just two of many individuals well aware that the issue is not from heavy rain events.
"The reason the flooding has been so bad lately, is just because, we've had a lot of high tides," North Beach Community Association Board Member, Carrie Meyer said. "There's storms in the Gulf that didn't even come here that pushed the water towards our beaches and raised it up, the saltwater. So that then, when you get a higher tide, it moves the water through the system and it back flows into the streets."
While there's only so much one can do to fight against Mother Nature, TxDOT has assisted as much as the water will allow them to.
"TxDOT is coming in and pumping that area out, but the water level has to be low enough in the bay so that when we pump the water, it just doesn't come right back in," Rickey Dailey with TxDOT said.
As the state does their part the City continues to do so as well.
"If a low lying area has water in it, and your drainage solution is up here, it's not going to drain into this," Meyer said. "So you have to bring things up a little just to get enough slope to drain into the drainage system. That's what the grading plan is about that the engineer already did for North Beach and the City will be implementing piece by piece, starting with Beach Avenue, elevating Beach Avenue and elevating Gulf Spray."
Residents in the area are also asking the City to consider new safety measures as it pertains to the pending new flow of traffic once both the drainage canal and new Harbor Bridge are complete.