So many striking quotes in this New York Times article, including this one from the frustrated president of the local homeowners’ association:
“If we keep doing this [nothing/retreating], Rhode Island will be gone. We’re trying to find a balance. We’re not killing baby seals out here.”
What strikes me most about this is how very common this situation already feels, and how much more common it will become in the near future for so many communities. How long before nobody outside of coastal communities even remarks on a row of buildings falling into the sea?
Also worth noting is that sea level rise isn’t so much as mentioned. Another reminder that, for much of our coast, the present is so overwhelming that the future is, quite literally, unimaginable.