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June 12, 2025
Key Takeaways:
West of the Hudson River in the densely-populated City of Hoboken, New Jersey, families gather on Madison Street to spend sunny days in ResilienCity Park. Some enjoy the green space while others bounce basketballs, ride bikes, and play in the playground. This five-acre recreational hub, however, fulfills another purpose in addition to being a community gathering place. Capable of holding one million gallons of water in its underground stormwater retention tank and another 750,000+ gallons in its above-ground green infrastructure, ResilienCity Park serves its community on sunny and stormy days alike.
Expensive extreme weather events are becoming more common because of climate change. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in 2024 there were 27 weather and climate events costing $1 billion or more in damages. Reacting to extreme weather events as they happen is difficult and expensive, yet this is the federal government’s predominant approach. At EESI’s briefing Understanding the Budget, Reconciliation, and Appropriations Process, panelist Richard Kogan of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explained, “Emergencies have constituted 0.16% of U.S. GDP per year since 1989, yet the [Congressional] budget resolutions usually assume that there will be zero dollars needed for emergencies.”
Adaptation, or taking steps to reduce the impacts of climate change before they occur, can prevent damage to infrastructure and assets as well as loss of life, all of which contribute to the overall cost of a severe weather event. A study by Allstate and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce found that “every $1 spent on climate resilience and preparedness saves communities $13 in damages, cleanup costs, and economic impact.”
For communities like Hoboken interested in adapting infrastructure to minimize the consequences of climate change, federal aid and loan programs have been critical. In 2012, a tidal surge from Hurricane Sandy submerged 80% of Hoboken, leaving the city fully aware of its vulnerability to coastal flooding. New Jersey was not alone: the storm raged across 13 states, causing more than $70 billion in damages.
In the aftermath, the Obama Administration’s Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced “Rebuild by Design” (RBD), a competition for cities to win funding for climate adaptation projects. After receiving 150 applications, HUD selected 10 finalists, and paired each city with world-class architects, engineers, and community planners to design solutions for their unique challenges. Ultimately, $930 million in federal grants were distributed to seven cities.
New Jersey received funding for two RBD projects: RBD – Hudson River and RBD – Meadowlands. RBD – Hudson River—which includes sub-projects like ResilienCity in Hoboken as well as projects in Weehawken and Jersey City—initially received $230 million for floodwall construction, and has since received more funding for Harborside Park, a resiliency park incorporating a floodwall to resist coastal storm surge. The City of Hoboken and its partners at the North Hudson Sewerage Authority constructed ResilienCity Park with funding from federal and county grants, as well as the municipal open space trust fund.
Jennifer Gonzalez, Director of Climate Action + Innovation for the City of Hoboken, explained how federal funding was critical for the city’s adaptation efforts: “Projects like ResilienCity Park, with a stormwater storage capacity of up to two million gallons and five new stormwater pumps, require capital investment that exceeds what a city of one square mile and 60,000 residents can fund alone. Federal and state funding allowed us to think long-term and build not just flood infrastructure, but multi-functional community assets.”
For its share of RBD – Hudson River, Hoboken deployed an adaptation strategy with four steps to combat flooding: resist, delay, store, and discharge. Resist, focuses on building levees, berms, seawalls, and bulkheads around the city, which are currently under construction by the State’s Department of Environmental Protection. Next, the city implemented green infrastructure projects to delay or prevent stormwater runoff from overwhelming the old sewer system. Retention basins, like those underneath ResilienCity Park, were built to store water during storms. Pumps were installed to move water in the city back into the river after floodwaters recede.
“One of the most important lessons is to invest before disaster strikes. Hoboken was ready to act after [Hurricane] Sandy because we had already been exploring resilient strategies [through the city’s Green Infrastructure Strategic Plan]. Additionally, adaptation funding should support multi-functional designs. The city’s resiliency parks are proof that flood mitigation can go hand-in-hand with recreation, equity, and urban design. Finally, we’ve learned the value of partnerships—working with the North Hudson Sewerage Authority, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, and even the power utility PSE&G has amplified our impact. Communities that build coalitions and seek funding across sectors will go further, faster,” said Gonzalez.
Across Hoboken, there are three open resiliency parks, of which ResilienCity is the largest, and three more in construction or design to store or rebuff stormwater to mitigate flooding. Each park has rain gardens and green infrastructure, like permeable pavers and bioretention areas, as well as recreational areas such as pickleball courts, amphitheaters, and walkways. The dual-purpose facilities showcase the possible functionality of climate adaptation. Adaptation not only allows cities to be prepared for climate impacts, but can also improve daily life through public resources—like a five-acre park for families to enjoy in the middle of a metropolitan area.
Managing Storms Through Green Infrastructure
At EESI’s Towards Healthier Outcomes in Surface Transportation briefing, panelist Jacob Miller, of the Smart Surfaces Coalition, described how the transition to green infrastructure and smart surfaces (such as cool roofs and porous concrete) is reducing the energy consumption of cities across the country. During his remarks, Miller noted that in Washington, D.C., retrofitted intersections with green stormwater infrastructure are “a pretty simple solution that enables us to slow traffic, make the city cooler, and manage stormwater all at once.”
ResilienCity Park was created from a vacant asphalt lot. BASF, a chemical company, bought the site in 2010. According to a BASF media release, the group “remediated contaminants in the soil and installed a protective asphalt cap over the remediated area” before selling it back to the City of Hoboken in 2016. The site acquisition cost $26 million and park development cost $52 million, making the total estimated cost of ResilienCity $78 million.
Until it was abruptly discontinued in April 2025, the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program offered competitive grants for community pre-disaster mitigation projects to lessen future damage. ResilienCity Park received five grants totaling $10 million from BRIC over the past six years. The project’s other major funding sources were the federal Clean Water State Revolving Fund and Hudson County’s Open Space Trust Fund.
The benefits of Hoboken’s investment in adaptation have quickly become apparent. In 2022 and 2023, Hoboken saw an 88% reduction in all rainfall flooding events, and flooding was prevented in 107 out of 121 storms. Up to 4.2 million gallons of rain and stormwater were isolated in the resiliency parks during these storm events.
This level of success is dependent on a city’s ability to maneuver federal grant programs and systems. Caleb Stratton, Hoboken’s chief resilience officer and business administrator, noted that federal grant-writing has its own vocabulary that local officials have to learn: “The language that local government speaks doesn’t necessarily translate to the federal lexicon when putting projects into programs. There is a needed translation of the project’s intent into the format the federal government can digest.” For Stratton, this means turning the costs and benefits of a project into a formula that shows the federal government that for every dollar the city invests in a project, it can reduce the direct financial risk to the community by at least the same amount if not more.
Often, this work of translation and grant research requires outside technical assistance. For instance, Stratton explained that Hoboken was able to hire grant writing consultants “to ensure that we were looking for funding in the right places.” He added that not every locality has the funds to employ such experts, saying, “increased technical support for smaller or under-resourced municipalities would help ensure that all communities, not just those with in-house capacity or funding to hire grant consultants, can build resilience.”
Gonzalez’s additional suggestions for improving federal adaptation funding systems include a central coordinating agency and more pre-disaster funding. “A centralized resilience funding mechanism or interagency coordination office could streamline this [process],” she explained. “We also need more emphasis on pre-disaster adaptation funding. It’s more cost-effective and allows communities to design with vision rather than the urgency required in a state of emergency when recovery is key.”
Hoboken’s use of federal assistance and the Rebuild by Design program has significantly limited flooding and future storm damages across the city. Federal aid, grant, and loan programs give communities the opportunity to adapt systems and infrastructure to meet the demands of a warmer climate—while simultaneously developing public spaces for residents to come together.
Authors: Hadley Brown and Hannah Wilson-Black
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