Flooding isn't foreign to people around Lansing, especially in areas like Potter Park and South Pennsylvania Ave.
A bit part of that is because of the location.
Because that area is one of the lowest in the city, water finds its way there.
"If you get a storm event that's raining cats and dogs and it basically overwhelms the storm sewer system where the water literally can't get into the catch basins, it's going to go to the lowest point in the general region," explains Chad Gamble of the Lansing department of public works. "That low point is the water catch viaduct right near Potter park."
As a whole, Gamble says the city is prepared for a typical storm. That's because the city's systems are built for ten-year storms. The one that hit Mount Pleasant was likely a 100-year storm or more, which means it's a storm so severe it would probably only happen once every 100 years.
To upgrade to a system that would handle that, it would cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
As the system works now, it's worth spending that money elsewhere.
