SUBMERGING THE STRIP Coralville is a bedroom community, commercial center, and gateway to University of Iowa’s sports facilities and hospital complex. The city is adjacent to Iowa City on the west side of the Iowa River. Coralville had a population of about 15,000 in 2008.

VULNERABLE CORRIDORS Coralville’s Highway 6 corridor, known locally as “the Coralville Strip” or simply “the Strip,” is lined with businesses along with apartment complexes catering to university students and the local workforce. A similar corridor stretches along First Avenue from Highway 6 to Interstate 80. It is home to numerous more businesses and apartments. Unlike Iowa City, where the Iowa River is a focal point of the university’s lower campus, Coralville’s flood risks are less apparent. The Iowa River roughly parallels First Avenue and that river’s tributary, Clear Creek, runs parallel to the Strip. Both waterways are tucked behind commercial buildings, parking lots, industrial sites, and wooded areas. When the floodwaters rose, many in Coralville were astounded to find that they lived just a block or two from a waterway that soon engulfed their businesses or apartments.

THE DAMAGE At the flood’s peak, a half-mile of the east end of the Strip was a lake several feet deep. The southernmost half-mile of First Avenue was also flooded. According to Coralville’s assistant city administrator, Ellen Habel, flooding began June 5 and continued in some areas until July 6. At its peak, water was 8 feet deep in the center of Highway 6 on the east end of the Strip. More than 300 housing units were evacuated and about 400 houses and 200 businesses were damaged. In total, about 273 acres of Coralville flooded. Some areas were without power for months. The flooding of the city’s two major corridors was devastating for two reasons: the density of businesses and housing there meant the damage was disproportionately large and the loss of the city’s two major traffic arteries for two weeks made it difficult to impossible to access even those businesses that remained dry. The road closures also disrupted traffic in and out of the university and its hospitals and clinics. The latter lost an estimated $6 million in revenue due to the flood, according to a State of Iowa press release. “Businesses are dealing with loss of inventory, cleanup costs, limited accessibility; people can’t get to you because streets are closed,” said Habel at the time.

The view of the intersection of First Avenue and Highway 6 from the south shows how the flood paralyzed Coralville’s two major traffic arteries and a major commercial area.

Coraville’s Highway 6 strip became a lake during the 2008 floods.

THE MITIGATION A total of 18 properties were bought out with the help of CDBG funds in Coralville — few in comparison with the number of properties bought out in Iowa City. The focus of flood mitigation in Coralville was a comprehensive system of infrastructure built with the help of CDBG funds and other federal, state, and local sources. An October 2009 State of Iowa report said the improvements provide the backbone of flood protection for the community’s central business district at a level one foot above the 2008 flood. Permanent and removable flood walls, berms, a stormwater pump station, embankments, street and bridge elevation, stormwater improvements, and other work now protect businesses and the important arterial streets of Highway 6 and First Avenue, the report said. “The City of Coralville will make significant infrastructure improvements that will ensure business owners never suffer again because of flooding,” said an October 2010 State of Iowa press release. It said businesses “along First Avenue, Interstate Highway 80, Clear Creek, and the Iowa River were not willing to rebuild where they might be wiped out again in the future,” according to Coralville City Administrator Kelly Hayworth. “The flood walls and berms included in Coralville’s project have given business owners the peace of mind they need to return.” “By funding the project to raise both the bridge and street level, [the State and its partners] helped ensure traffic can continue to flow to the Hospitals and Clinics,” the release said. “Also, the program is investing in Coralville’s business interests. Hayworth notes that the protective measures in the area will result in creation and retention of more than 2,000 jobs.” The press release noted, “A new 100-condominium project is on the drawing board to replace the 100-unit apartment complex destroyed by flooding in the same area. That could never have happened without the flood mitigation on Biscuit Creek and Clear Creek, Hayworth said.” “Since 2008 we’ve done $64 million in [flood mitigation] improvements,” said Coralville City Engineer Dan Holderness in a July 2014 article in the Iowa City Press-Citizen. “We’re in a much better position to protect residents and businesses.”

The article said that Coralville’s key improvements since 2008 included: • Reconstructing and raising of the First Avenue

bridge to allow water to more easily pass underneath.

• Building flood walls and berms along the former Edgewater Drive.

• Adding four stormwater pump stations along the river, two new pump stations on Clear Creek, and upgrading two existing pump stations.

• Constructing earthen berms and permanent and removable flood walls along Clear Creek and Biscuit Creek.

• Raising the CRANDIC railroad embankment, raising and lengthening the CRANDIC railroad Clear Creek Bridge, and constructing earthen berms and concrete flood walls along the river.

Many of these projects were funded with a combination of CDBG, state and other federal funds.

EYEWITNESS: A NIGHTMARE The University of Iowa’s History Corps interviewed some Coralville businesspeople and residents after the flood. The following two interviews, edited for space and clarity, give dramatic, first-person perspectives on the flood in Coralville. For more History Corps flood interviews: thestudio.uiowa.edu/historycorps/exhibits/show/flood/floodinterviews

“IT WAS LIFE-CHANGING” Sanja and Maya Hunt own Every Bloomin’ Thing Flower Shop. Located at the intersection of Highway 6 and Rocky Shore Drive, theirs was the easternmost flooded business on the Strip in 2008. They had four feet of water in their shop. “My most memorable thing was walking into that place with our insurance adjuster — we were lucky enough to have flood insurance — while ducks were swimming in the parking lot and just staring at the mayhem. Everything, even the heaviest furniture, was topsy-turvy. The floor had half an inch of mud all over. The smell. Oh, my gosh — musty, heavy, nasty. We did not have power until almost October. “It looked like a bomb dropped and things were scattered all over on the whole Coralville Strip. All of our neighbors looked exactly like us. People were just putting stuff out into the air. It’s almost a nightmare to remember it. I think I have emotionally detached myself from it. “To deliver flowers you’d have to go all the way around town on the interstate. Half an hour, traffic’s backed up, everyone’s having issues driving. It rearranged our lives for the summer. We were operating from minute to minute. You just had to adjust because the flood put everybody out of business, and everybody’s schedule was screwed up. Everyone else was in the same boat. The whole community didn’t get back to normal for probably a year. “We did everything ourselves. I hired people. I supervised people. We pretty much fended for ourselves. We took everything to the dump ourselves. We borrowed a dump trailer. We only had so much money to work with, and I didn’t want to — and didn’t — borrow any money. We worked with just what the insurance covered. “We’re just glad it’s behind us. It was life changing. During the flood I went up on the retaining wall that stands across from our flower shop in front of Carver Hawkeye Drive and looked down the street, and it was so eerie. The lights were still changing, but you were looking down on a lake. There were ducks swimming along.”

“YOU HAVE TO LEAVE!” Sisters Liz and Katherine Johnson were University of Iowa students who had grown up in Cedar Rapids and shared an apartment in Coralville. Caught unaware by the flood, they escaped with their cats, a few possessions, and each other. Their sisterly dialogue is an insightful account of the psychological aftereffects of the disaster — and how their sense of humor helped them cope. They were interviewed in October 2008. Liz: I left work early and it started pouring on the way home, and there were five Caterpillar machines and 20 people running around with sandbags and shovels and some lady with a megaphone yelling “You have one hour! You have to leave!” I go inside. I can’t think. I’m panicking. The cats are just looking at me like “You look a little stressed. Why aren’t you feeding us?” Goldie sat underneath my bed in the center. I was yelling at her — like it meant anything to her — “Goldie, you have to come with me! We’re having a flood!” It took 20 minutes to get her into the carrier. By the time I carried both the cats two and a half blocks up to the car, my hour turned into five minutes. I walked into your room thinking, “I don’t know what she wants. I don’t know what she needs.” I picked up your dirty laundry because I thought, “She wore it. She’ll want it.” Katherine: I was in class. If I had lived alone there, I wouldn’t have had anything. Liz: Yeah, and it’s just stuff. But it’s our stuff. It was 2.5 weeks before we got back in. Twenty inches of water just sat in the dark, hot apartment, and there was mold everywhere. Katherine: The back of the couch — Liz: Our great $50 couch that was the first piece of furniture I ever bought! I was going to keep that after I got out of grad school. Katherine: Seeing my book, The Audacity of Hope, completely crumbled and disintegrated. Liz: The irony! We had to just throw stuff over the porch railing. [Chokes up] I had wanted to give it proper burial. Katherine: Mom said, “It’s a good opportunity to pare down.” Liz: I could have killed her. [Cries]

Katherine: It’s a good thought, to be simple and pare down. But when you don’t have a choice— Liz: That first night we went to Walmart to get stuff, and we found that giant bin of [giggles] discount movies — Katherine: — and I bought all the natural disaster movies! [Laughs] We watched Countdown: The Sky’s on Fire. And then I left and got a tattoo. Liz: Did the flood make you impulsive? Katherine: Yeah. It’s good to plan for the future, but when what you’re going through is so stressful, you just don’t care. Liz: I couldn’t handle anything after the flood. One of the cats got sick, and I just lost it. I had no control over what I was feeling. I had no idea this was going to happen. I didn’t realize we lived on Clear Creek. I should have, but my brain didn’t want to go there. We’d found an apartment and we were happy about it. Katherine: And now we found another apartment and it’s on the top of a hill. Liz: It was really stressful. I needed something to be mad about. There was so much anger that did not have to do with you not washing out my Coq au Vin pan. But you can’t get angry at the flood, and [chokes up] you can’t make it give back your stuff. Katherine: But you can get angry at people. Liz: Having one hour to get everything I cared about out of the apartment all by myself. I was angry at everybody because nobody was there with me. [Cries] We went and sandbagged the day after we got evacuated. That was not a good idea. I felt I had to do something to save Iowa City from this flood. And what I really needed was a nap. I was just too stressed and traumatized. Katherine: Sandbagging — there were a million people, and everyone was trying to be in charge, and it reminds you of why these things don’t work very well. It creates a sense of community, but people don’t always work together the best. Liz: There was that random kid who kept trying to give us Gatorade. Katherine: I thought that was really cute. He was doing his part.

Liz: He tried to give us Gatorade 40 times. Katherine: And you didn’t have shoes on. Liz: No, which was so unsafe! Oh, kid. [Cries] Katherine: I can’t go to the library. I can’t go to my house. I can’t go to the Cedar Rapids library — [chokes up] Liz: We grew up there. Katherine: That’s why I wanted to be a librarian, and it’s destroyed. Liz: That made me cry, seeing the Cedar Rapids library on TV filled with water. If I had been living with anyone else, I think I would have killed them. But we could just get mad at the cats. Katherine: Yeah. It helps that we can make jokes about everything. It was horrible, and it changed our lives, but it is still kind of funny. Liz: It was funny. Katherine: Taking that entertainment center out to the trash and the doors shattered and the glass broke, and I started swearing. And then I looked over and there are the TV cameras. And I’m like, “Oh. Right. Probably shouldn’t say that.”

Many Coralville apartment buildings were flooded.

WHERE THE MONEY WENT - DOWNLOAD iowaeconomicdevelopment.com/userdocs/ModuleResources/IowaCityMoney.pdf

BUYOUTS AND INFRASTRUCTURE More than 92 percent of CDBG flood recovery funding spent in Coralville went to improving public infrastructure: bridges, flood walls, berms, and stormwater pump stations. Nearly eight percent of the rest funded 18 property buyouts. A bit more than a tenth of one percent was used for grant administration.

HOUSING About 59 percent of CDBG housing money in Coralville went toward the production of new single-family homes. The remaining approximately 41 percent went to the production of new multi-family housing units.