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After Isabel
Thu Nov 13, 2003
Listen in RealAudio 
Hi, I’m Bryan Yeaton for The Weather Notebook. Today, Leda Hartman reports on how Hurricane
Isabel has changed the landscape of North Carolina.
In places, the outer banks are not much more than a glorified sand bar. They’re low-lying,
narrow and constantly shifting…not the most stable place for an asphalt highway. But for
years, State Route 12 has connected the islands. When Hurricane Isabel hit, it created a new
inlet 10 feet deep and 2-thousand feet wide, leaving Hatteras Island isolated. Some
environmental groups have said the state should look at alternatives to Route 12, like
building more bridges or using more ferries. Todd Miller is Executive Director of the North
Carolina Coastal Federation.
TM: There’s so much invested there now that we’re not thinking people are going to depopulate
these islands.
But, he says, there’s a risk to just rebuilding route 12 and developing
indiscriminately.
TM: We get a strong storm coming in, we have not learned from the lessons of Isabel and have
built back bigger and stronger and in more dangerous places – basically setting ourselves up
for the next disaster.
But Linda O’Neill can’t wait to see that ribbon of road once again. She’s the owner of the
Village Marina Motel Campground in Hatteras, where she rode out the storm. Without route 12,
O’Neill says,
LO'N: it would ruin the village. Because it would take people too long to get here, and
they’d say ‘the heck with it’ and go somewhere else.
Yet even more than the road, O’Neill says what she’d really like is running water. For The
Weather Notebook, I’m Leda Hartman.
Correspondent Leda Hartman is from Pittsboro, North Carolina. The Weather Notebook is
supported by The National Science Foundation, and Subaru of America. Thanks today to the
entire Weather Notebook staff, Doug Sanborn, Melody Nester, Sean Doucette, and Peter Crane.
Today's Links
Pictures from the International Space Station:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=10364
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