‘Managed Retreat’ Offers Relief for People in Endangered Homes and Communities
They say home is where the heart is, but for someone’s heart to be at home they need to feel safe and secure.
What happens when that safety and security are upended? What happens when natural disasters like flooding or wildfires wreak havoc? Do people and communities stay and rebuild, or do they face this new reality and move away and start again?
This leave-or-stay dilemma is gripping ever-increasing numbers of communities that are faced with elements of the current climate crisis.
The concept of the “managed retreat” is gaining traction as factors including flooding and rising sea levels have forced policymakers, engineers, and academics to shift their focus away from holding nature back—through technology such as sea walls—to simply getting out of nature’s way.
But the idea of resettlement is not accepted by all, with the word “retreat” itself being too much for some to accept, especially when their roots in their current communities run deep.
When 'Safe' Isn't
Climate-related events that have detrimental impacts on communities around the world are on the rise.
According to USA Facts, which relies on government statistics, over the last 40 years, the number of natural disasters in the US that cost over $1 billion has increased. In the 1980s, the US averaged three billion-dollar disasters a year, compared with an average of 13 such disasters a year in the 2010s.
“Not only are natural disasters occurring more frequently, but the average cost and death toll from each is up as well,” USA Facts said. It added that the National Centers for Environmental Information, which has kept track of billion-dollar natural disasters since 1980, cites “climate change as a critical reason for the increase."
Globally, natural disasters displace millions of people each year, said Our World in Data, another fact-based resource that collects data and research related to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and is published by Global Change Data Lab.
Over the last century, deaths from disasters have “fallen significantly,” thanks to early warning systems, coordinated responses, and other relief efforts, noted Our World in Data authors Hannah Ritchie and Dr. Pablo Rosado. But “the economic costs of extreme events can be severe and hard to recover from. This is particularly true in lower-income countries,” wrote University of Oxford Professor Max Roser, founder of Our World in Data.
A ‘New Normal’?
Whether it is temperatures peaking at a sweltering 116° F in Sardinia or homes literally falling off English cliffs due to coastal erosion, many climate experts fear the world could be heading toward a worrying “new normal.”
In fact, some studies predict damage from flooding may increase 160%–240% globally, and flood deaths may soar 70%–83% by 2100, even under a scenario of a mere 1.5°C (2.7°F) increase in average global temperatures. Another study predicted that in the US by 2100, nearly 500 coastal communities and 4.2 million residents may face flood disruption due to rises in sea levels.
With this kind of new reality in mind, experts are increasingly pondering what alternative approaches are available if mitigating against the intensifying magnitude of such extreme events is no longer possible.
What Is a Managed Retreat?
One view gaining ground is the belief that the only solution for impacted communities is to uproot and start again elsewhere. Known as “managed retreat,” the concept involves transferring people, possessions, and, if necessary, entire buildings to a safe location where a new community can be formed.
“Managed retreat” involves transferring people, possessions, and entire buildings, if necessary, to a safe location where a new community can be formed.
“It is this idea that there are places that will either be too expensive or too dangerous—or perhaps simply impossible—to maintain or to continue to rebuild in the same way after a disaster,” said Dr. Leah Dundon, director and an expert on managed retreats from Vanderbilt Climate Change Initiative at the Vanderbilt University School of Engineering in Nashville, Tennessee. “So, should we as a society consider moving humans or human structures away from that area permanently?”
Resettlements, Then and Now
The concept is not a new one, with the town of Niobrara, Nebraska, being the earliest US wholesale flood relocation.
In March 1881, an ice dam on the Missouri River flooded up to 100 miles upstream, putting Niobrara under more than 6 feet of water. Residents chose to move their entire town, and in the space of just two months, buildings were removed from their foundations and dragged upslope by horses to a site just under 2.5km (about 1.5 miles) away. By January 1882, most homes and all the town’s commercial buildings were in their new places.
 Flooding in Niobrara, Nebraska in 1881 (left) led to the US’s first “managed retreat” (right). ©Courtesy of History Nebraska |  |
More recently, the entire Louisiana town of Isle de Jean Charles was forced to pack up and move. Many of the inhabitants are members of or related to Native American tribes, such as the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw. But since 1955, the island has seen 98% of its land lost to coastal erosion; a major factor are the levees in the Mississippi River that disrupt natural sediment replenishment of the island’s marshes.
More recently, the entire Louisiana town of Isle de Jean Charles was forced to pack up and move.
In 2016, the community teamed up with the State of Louisiana to enter a competition run by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. Known as The National Disaster Resilience Competition, it was the first fund of its kind “to help communities respond to climate change, save public resources, revitalize and modernize infrastructure, and improve access to opportunity for vulnerable populations.” Almost $1 billion was awarded to 13 states and communities.
Entrants had to explain why they should receive a $48.3 million grant, with Isle de Jean Charles’s bid proving successful. Work then began to find a suitable new home.
In December 2018, a 515-acre patch of rural land in Terrebonne Parish was bought for $11.7 million. A plan was put in place to build 120 homes, commercial and retail buildings, a community center and walking trails.
Since August 2022, a total of 34 families have moved to the new community, while others have moved elsewhere in the state but retain the option of joining the community later.
Challenges
There are significant challenges to managed retreats. The financial cost can be huge, not just in terms of moving people and building new homes, but also compensating for loss of land or property. A 2019 article, “Managed Retreat in the US,” published in One Earth, estimated that $1.4 trillion of real estate is located within 700 feet of the US coast. As sea-level rises are projected to impact between 4 million and 13 million people, if 1 in 10 of these communities needed to be moved to a managed retreat, it would cost an estimated $140 billion, almost 30 times what the Federal Emergency Management Agency has so far spent on managed retreats.
It is estimated that $1.4 trillion of real estate is located within 700 feet of the US coast.
And uprooting from a home is often not just about money. It is about severing familiar connections, something known as “place attachment,” and it poses a significant challenge.
“People become very attached to where they live and don't want to leave,” said Dundon, whose research has previously focused on the concept of managed retreats. She said psychology, rather than just logistics and finance, plays a huge part in making managed retreats viable.
“Imagine if you lived in the same house your great-great grandparents lived in that has been passed down through the generations and suddenly you are told to leave, but you will get paid for the house.”
The debate previously came to a head in California, where some of its coastline is vulnerable to rising sea levels. The California Coastal Commission told cities to look at retreat as a potential option, but many local governments rejected the idea. The situation in California has also led to legal challenges and political disagreement about the best way forward.
Are Attitudes Changing?
But according to Dundon, there may come a time where pragmatism—and cost—force more people to accept the idea.
“I think many people will become more concerned, or at least familiar, with issues of retreat when they see extremely expensive prices for flood insurance.”
Dundon said: “I think many people will become more concerned, or at least familiar, with issues of retreat when they see extremely expensive prices for flood insurance or cannot get a bank to write a mortgage on a house that is in an area of increasing climate risk.”
She added that this level of acceptance differs around the world. Her research found that European countries seem to have a more developed process and case studies about successful retreats.
“In the US,” she continued, “there are often obligations for local or other governments to maintain certain infrastructure once it is there and once people become dependent on it, so it may not be as easy for a local government to, for example, say they will not repair a road [the] next time it floods.”
According to Dundon, the very word “retreat” also had connotations that left many people feeling uneasy when faced with the prospect of having to uproot.
"The very phrase ‘managed retreat’ can be problematic. It sounds too defeatist to many, and people want their public officials to ‘do something’, not ‘retreat’,” she added. But as attitudes and realities change, so too does the need to evolve and adapt at policy level, with new designs and disaster planning evolving to embrace the concept of managed retreats.
Dundon said: “There is a lot of interest in sustainability design, resiliency planning and more, right across the globe, and I see a lot in the US. Climate change is something that is not going away. The question is how much worse will we let it get … adaptation to a world with a different climate has become the reality.”
*Mark Smith is a journalist and author from the UK. He has written on subjects ranging from business and technology to world affairs, history, and popular culture for the Guardian, BBC, Telegraph, and magazines in the United States, Europe, and Southeast Asia.