Why is this house wearing stilts? To keep it safe from flood damage.

This picture shows a house across the street from Peachtree Creek, near downtown Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
Question:  "Why is the front door 10 feet off the ground?"
Answer:  "Because the first floor of the house is 10 feet up."

Question:  "Why would someone build a house with the first floor so high?"
Answer:  "They didn't. In 1977 the house was raised 10 feet because Peachtree Creek flooded the first floor in 1975 and 1976."

Question:  "Why would someone build a house where it floods?"
Answer:  Well, this is harder to answer. One possibility is that when these houses were built in the late 1940's and early 1950's that Peachtree Creek did not flood as often and as severely as it does now. Studies have shown that as development and the amount of impervious surfaces increases in a watershed, streams can flood more often.

Learn more about how impervious surfaces can contribute to localized urban flooding.