Nightmare for Florida's coastal homeowners

Washington

ON a predictably gorgeous South Florida afternoon, Coral Gables mayor Jim Cason sat in his office overlooking the white-linen restaurants of this affluent seaside community and wondered when climate change would bring it all to an end. He figured that it would involve a boat.

When he first started worrying about sea-level rise, he asked his staff to count not just how much coastline the city had (76 km) or value of the property along that coast (US$3.5 billion). He also told them to find out how many boats dock inland from the bridges that span the city's canals (302). What matters, he guessed, will be the first time that a mast fails to clear the bottom of one of those bridges because the water level had risen too far.