Flooding in Chicago Is Getting Worse. Here’s Why.
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- University of Illinois warned in Bulletin 76 that climate‑driven intense rain will become much more severe over the next 25 years.
- Chicago’s century‑old sewer system can handle only 2 inches of rain in 24 hours, while storms now drop >8.5 inches, a seven‑fold rise in heavy‑rain likelihood over the past 100 years.
- Deep Tunnel—a multibillion‑dollar underground network built over the last 50 years—captures floodwater but cannot prevent neighborhood sewers from backing up into basements.
- 2023 storms dumped 8–9 inches on the West and South Sides, flooding tens of thousands of homes and displacing hundreds.
- Clabe Johnson’s Austin apartment was flooded with 4 feet of water in July 2023; his brother Gene suffered mold‑related respiratory illness.
Why it matters: Chicago homeowners lose billions in property damage—tens of thousands of homes flooded in 2023—while insurers and the city face soaring repair bills and a public‑health crisis from mold, forcing costly upgrades to the aging sewer system.
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