Cavernous Surge Tank Protects Tokyo From Floods | Tokyo
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A massive underground surge tank protects Tokyo from the yearly onslaughts of typhoons and storms, many similar in force to Hurricane Sandy. Full Story: In the low-lying suburbs of Tokyo, an underground pump station protects the capital from flooding. Japan's land ministry says it is the world's current largest solution to flooding. Here is a pump station for the Tokyo Metropolitan Floodway, the end point of a 3.7 mile (6 kilometer) long network of tunnels, capable of channeling away storm waters at the rate of 5 Olympic-size swimming pools every minute. The aim is to prevent scenes like those in New York this week, when Hurricane Sandy caused widespread flooding across parts of the city. A study of several towns in Tokyo's low-lying northern suburbs before and after the water system was completed in 2006, shows positive results. [Takashi Komiyama, Pump Station Chief]: "The floodway is directly protecting people from floods, the results are there. The damage is down by about two-thirds, in terms of both the number of homes that get flooded and the areas that are impacted." The jewel of the system is a cavernous surge tank measuring 580 feet (177 meters) long, 256 feet (78 meters) wide and 59 feet (18 meters) high. As smaller rivers rise during typhoons, the water is diverted into the tank through 3.9 miles (6.3 kilometres) of tunnels at a maximum rate of 260 cubic yards (200 cubic meters) every second. From there, the water is slowly pumped into the Edo River, a waterway large enough to handle the extra volume. With a price tag of about U.S. $2.9 billion (230 billion yen) the system wasn't cheap, but Koriyama says the United States should keep it in mind—if there's space. [Takashi Komiyama, Pump Station Chief]: "The best idea for town planning is of course to make sure your river routes are in the right place and on the right ground. But for areas that haven't been able to do that, well, new underground floodways would work well to stop flooding. But in the case of New York, all the space underground has been used up for development, and I think it would probably be difficult to put in floodways." Every year, Tokyo is swept by typhoons and storms, many similar in force to Hurricane Sandy. In 1991, a typhoon swamped nearly 24,710 acres (10,000 hectares) of land and flooded more than 30,000 homes in the low-lying areas around Tokyo's northern fringes, according to Land Ministry figures. Construction of the floodway began 2 years later and was fully completed by 2006. For more news and videos visit ☛ http://ntdtv.org Follow us on Twitter ☛ http://twitter.com/NTDTelevision Add us on Facebook ☛ http://on.fb.me/s5KV2C
Comments
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why dig a hole when you can build mountain? just kidding...
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meanwhile in america, they use drills for oil and bunkers
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We have a similar system here in Chicago, called "Deep Tunnel." It's over 100 miles of a large tunnel, about 300 feet underground, that holds about 2.3 billion gallons of rainwater. Believe me, it does help! But even so, there have been rainstorms that fill it up quickly and the city still floods in places. Plans are to keep digging. . .
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the volume of water that thing holds is 65,527,193.6 with water being 7.48 gallons per cubic foot
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NYC is above sea level even at the low points it has some 5-6 feet so why would these people recommend it to a city that does not need it?? Very strange comments. And how did I get to this video loll...
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Tokyo is worried about floods? I don't think your waterway can handle a tsunami, sorry...
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Japan's version of Tolkein's Dwarrowdelf :D
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The Netherlands, Japan are better prepared for these disasters than the USA because they've always have these problems and across the years they have learned how protect themselves from said disasters at whatever the cost, Florida USA gets hurricanes every year and haven't done much about it, they keep building the same houses because is profitable for insurance companies to have poorly build homes.
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Flooding due to rainfall is one thing. Flooding due to storm surge though is quite different. Sandy hit the coast during near high tide and a full moon. I don't see how a system like this could have protected the hundreds of towns strewn along the Jersey Coast and the dozens of neighborhoods in NY. Too many inlets, too many streams, too many rivers leading into the ocean. Most of these bodies of water are interconnected and when you have storm surge like that, a system like this wouldn't do much
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Yup another great idea implemented at whatever the cost is to get the job done right, by those who know how important it is to get it right. But the day the US ever gets something like this completed no matter the cost, will probably be the day I die of shock. LOL. Every time there is another Natural Disaster they have no idea how to deal with it, but the Japanese, even after the Tsunami and Nuclear disasters have recovered very quickly. The US should really take note of that, and fast.