General Discussion

It was a puzzle to me. My neighbor with the trailer home a yard or 2 from a large, always flowing, stream was fine because she was just high enough to be out of the flood plain.

You can actually see the flood plain in certain areas around here. It's great for growing crops in but don't build anything on it. It floods regularly and creates a very flat area, frequently covered in silt and mud after a rain.

Also I think in the mountains, the rivers have formed in the lowest areas. Water runs down hill, duh. So, most of the water will be in the lowest areas.

The streams form just to drain into the rivers. The streams, dry or constantly flowing, empty out quickly (due in part to the rocky ground and shale.) The streams may back up some, but they are smaller so flooding clears up quickly.

The top soil around here doesn't stay either. It's also constantly flows downhill. So, all of it runs through rocky streams into the rivers very rapidly. It doesn't flood the streams because of the steepness of the mountains. It just forces it all down into the rivers, or temporarily floods the roadway, then drains down.

They really don't have enough culverts and bridges to route the rain off the roads. Everytime we get more than a half inch of rain the main road here floods. Because the road department didn't want to spend tax dollars on a culvert on a road only used by about 50 people 22 years ago. Now, hundreds of people use the road and the transportation department hasn't caught up.

Also the old director of roads was prosecuted for embezzlement of our tax dollars. It is a Republican controlled district afterall.