Last week, fascinating photos grabbed the internet’s attention. Water gently lapping over docks, transforming coastal plazas into water features. Steps cascading into the depths rather than above them. In a Boston Globe video feature, a man back flips into the harbor from a protruding dock, typically far above the water’s surface, as toddlers splashed in the shallows.
Last week, Boston and the entire Eastern Seaboard experienced “king tides,” or unusually high tides. According to a Boston.com article, king tides are “1.5 to 2 feet higher than average daily high tides” and “are caused by an alignment in the orbits of the sun, moon, and Earth.” However, the most shocking aspect of the article came from a grim assessment of the tides.
“By 2070, the king tide-type of sea level rise seen this week is likely to be a daily occurrence.”
The king tides and the immediate effects were viewed as a sort of tourist attraction. It was something interesting and out of the ordinary to look at and document. The point-and-stare intuition is natural, but the potential for daily occurrence should have a sobering effect. This is not a tourist attraction but a potential reality. The faster we can understand this as residents of Boston, and the world, the faster change can be instigated.
Certainly, most of us are merely attending school in Boston. Some will stay and others will leave, also leaving behind a city at high risk of climate change. Yet, the lessons learned about climate change are universal and must be viewed as such. As students, we are temporary residents of one city but permanent residents of a world dealing with climate change.
At Boston University, we actively attempt to maintain a “green” presence in the city. By promoting environmentally friendly practices, an example is set, but also needs to be thoroughly maintained.
Within the City of Boston, there appears to be a lapse between talking about change and actually initiating it. As the Boston.com article suggests, a harbor barrier is in discussion. Two years ago, Mayor Martin Walsh launched the Boston Living with Water campaign, which called for substantive proposals of how to deal with rising sea levels. However, what change has been actually made? Has our harbor or coasts changed to account for rising levels? Is there a harbor barrier actually in the talks?
As a coastal city, water is something that has the potential to devastate us. Though he has not legitimately followed through on his proposals, Walsh is keenly aware of this fact, according to a statement he made in 2014.
“If that storm [Hurricane Sandy] hit just five hours earlier, that’s not New Jersey and New York, that’s Boston,” Walsh said at the unveiling of the “Living with Water” competition. “We would have seen 4 feet of water in the Quincy Market area, the Charlestown Navy Yard, Maverick Square in East Boston and City Point in South Boston. We weren’t any better prepared for that storm than New York and New Jersey, and we can’t count on luck in the future.”
As an editorial board, we’ve already discussed the absence of climate change conversation in the current election, but it’s worth mentioning that this is yet another blatant example of its importance. It needs to be discussed on a local and national level as well.
It is very easy to think of Back Bay as almost ancient and highly resilient, but it was quite literally underwater less than 300 years ago. This is a blink of an eye in the grand scope of time, and we must not forget that.
Cases like the king tides remind us that climate change is not so distant after all. Procrastination is no longer an option, and the “future generation” who will have to deal with the impacts of climate change is us.
