Committee on the Environment

A Enviromental Assessment for new museum proposal at the Stature of Liberty is open for comment.

Statue of Liberty New Museum Construction Environmental Assessment

An interesting set of issues. 

• Liberty Island is a Pending historic district.
• New construction proposed at National Park Site closed for months due to Hurricane Sandy.
• Island is a high risk flood area
• Increased security limits visitors access to interpretive exhibits in Statue.

The goals of the project are sound; increase visitor access to exhibits and provide shelter from weather. 

Seems that there are other alternatives that can be discussed. Some other issues.

• How can a building adapt as the sea levels rise?
• How do you build now, knowing that it will flood in the future?

Opportunity for an innovative response to climate change

Just some thoughts- to minimize the potential cost of restoring this new building after a future flood,  May be the visitor shelter is not conditioned space but an open structure that can be disassembled and rebuilt. May be the Museum is a portable building that can be removed to safety when in danger from a Storm.

In light of your comments, wonder if a floating solution would be an option and/or make sense to consider. May be other issues which might make this a challenge, such as rough water limiting usability of a floating museum, or whether stability issues could be solved to make this work. An interesting question...