Fort Worth To Expand Technology To Track Heavy Rainfall

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FORT WORTH (CBS11) - The City of Fort Worth has invested heavily in flood prevention in some of its most flood-prone areas.

Now, the city is planning to expand its flood warning system to better protect people who might fall outside current flood control projects.

"I worry about everybody around me and what their homes are going to be like," said Cecelia Perales who lives in a south Fort Worth neighborhoods where she says some homes still flood despite a large flood control project. "We had a lady down the street you had to move because her own constantly got flooded. Like, all the time!"

Fort Worth is now looking for ways to warn people of approaching floods before they happen.

"We are looking at our program overall knowing that there are so many flooding problems around the city that its going to be a long time before we can fix them so this is something we can do to help and protect people before we are able to actually fix the problem," said Greg Simmons, Assistant Director Transportation and Public Works Department of Stormwater Management Division.

Right now, the city has flood sensors that tell city officials when flood waters are rising and then it's up to Fort Worth to let residents know there's danger.

"What we are doing is seeing how we can expand that, how we can better communicate the information we have and what we might be able to do better in the future to warn people before it happens," Simmons said.

A big part of that will be more flood sensors and software that can predict possible flooding and warn people directly, possibly right to their smart phone.

"Sure it's that sort of thing," Simmons confirmed. "There's going to be a lot of web based things. There's going to be a lot of opportunity for the public and other entities that are interested to sort of customize the sort of information they're looking for."

The city is holding a public meeting in July at a time and location to be determined to receive public input on the upgrades.