Spectrum News NY1: As New Yorkers begin to leave coastal areas in the coming decades, spurred by rising sea levels and storm flooding, the consequences could ripple across the city and lead to displacement in low-income neighborhoods in Manhattan, the Bronx and Brooklyn, a new report suggests.

The analysis is one of the first predictions of how climate change could reshape the city’s map this century, as higher-income families in waterfront areas move toward inland communities with relatively low rents and high housing stock.

The findings, the report’s authors say, underscore the need for a long-term plan to handle an inevitable population shift across the five boroughs, with nearly one-fifth of the city’s current population living in areas that will be at risk of regular coastal flooding by the 2050s.

“The entire city is going to feel climate migration in one way or another,” said Amy Chester, the managing director of Rebuild By Design, a climate adaptation consulting firm based in New York, and an author of the report. “We need to start this conversation about where our neighbors are gonna go.” Read more >>