Utility, Engineering + Surveying - Summer 2019 - 4

UTILITYENGINEERING
SURVEYING
The exclusive magazine reporting on growing activities of UESI
www.asce.org/uesi

Extremes
Summer is upon us. For most that means heat and sunshine. But
for me right now sitting in my Houston office, it means rain, lots
and lots of rain.
This too shall pass but inevitably, every time a weather event
occurs someone drags out the "climate change" discussion. Regardless of your perspective, the facts remain that droughts will occur,
storm fronts will sweep across the country and weather will, on occasion, be extreme. For those of us in the utility infrastructure and
surveying markets, how we design, construct and manage systems
to handle these events is what matters.
Having to prepare for worst-case scenarios is not only expensive,
but very difficult to predict. Houston discovered it wasn't prepared
when in three consecutive years, new records for flooding were set.
First it was the Memorial Day Flood of 2015, which represented a
100-year flood event. That was followed by the Tax Day Flood in
2016, which was called a 500-year flood event. And of course, in
2017 Hurricane Harvey was rated as a 1,000-year storm event.
Houston is not alone in its miscalculations. This is a common
story for most cities, large and small. It is deemed not cost-effective
to prepare for events that have such a minuscule chance of ever
occurring-until it does.
Increasingly, the wisdom of preparing for extreme events has
become obvious. With modern media, the devastation from overpowering, weather-related or other natural disasters become very
real. Thus, we must prepare for the worst. While that may be prudent, such preventive measures are costly and come at a time when
cities' and government agencies' infrastructure needs are already at
record highs.
Which brings us to one of the features of this summer issue of
Utility Engineering + Survey (UES) magazine. The annual Pipelines
Conference convenes in Nashville from July 21-24. Leaders in the
design and construction of underground utility systems will be
present to learn and share problems and answers, while trying to
address industry issues. Technology will be on display that is critical to solving so many municipal infrastructure problems.
This is the place where key consulting engineers and cities gather to network and learn from their peers, for all must return home
and continue solving our infrastructure problems, regardless of the
challenges. *

Robert Carpenter

Editor-in-Chief
Utility Engineering + Surveying; Underground Construction

PUBLISHER
Brian Nessen

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EDITORIAL
Editor-in-Chief
Robert Carpenter
Managing Editor
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4 Utility Engineering + Surveying SUMMER 2019

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Utility, Engineering + Surveying - Summer 2019

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