3000 Post Oak Flood Protection Plan

The infamous 2015 Memorial Day Flood was heavily concentrated over southwest Houston, and within six hours had dropped 11 inches on grounds already saturated from the previous two months’ heavy rains. As the streets adjacent to 3000 Post Oak Building exceeded their capacity, the deluge flooded the 19-story commerical office building’s basement via the below-grade loading dock, with waters reaching 9.5 feet.

Walter P Moore’s Civil and Diagnostics groups were asked to conduct a site analysis and to fast-track a design that would protect the tower from future flooding. The combination of a below-grade loading dock that essentially invited water in and basement-level critical spaces that could not be relocated proved exceptionally challenging in determining the most resilient solution. The team surveyed the building to identify areas most vulnerable to water infiltration and conducted a runoff analysis to determine how much water would enter the site from overland flow, storm sewers, roof drainage, and from the face of the building. The final solution was to install a flood gate at the top of the loading dock and flood doors at the entrances to the basement at the loading dock.

The construction team installed the flood gates/doors only days prior to the 2016 Tax Day flooding event (dropping 16 inches of rain in less than 12 hours). Fortunately because of the placement of high level urgency on the project, the equipment was deployed as it was needed and used during the rain event.