Success Story: Resilience Planning
Princeville, public universities and partners facilitate resilience planning that honors town history
Project Purpose
Princeville, N.C., the first town chartered by formerly enslaved African Americans in the United States, has weathered multiple floods since the community’s founding. The town was founded in the Tar River floodplain after the Civil War, surrounded by swampy land undesirable to white landowners. A levee completed in 1965 protected the town from flooding for several decades until Hurricane Floyd in 1999, when upwards of 15 feet of floodwater sat in Princeville’s town center. Damage to the town’s infrastructure was devastating. The community rejected proposals to relocate the entire town and its residents to higher ground. However, the community flooded again after Hurricane Matthew. Princeville partnered with academia and nonprofits to develop a plan to adapt to the reality of flood risk and honor the community’s long history of Black self-determination.
Quick Facts
- Since formerly enslaved African Americans founded Princeville after the Civil War, the town has faced eight devastating floods. In 2016, water from Hurricane Matthew circumvented the levee and left 80% of the town flooded. The water destroyed about 450 homes (NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab, 2020).
- NC State University (NCSU) and its partners developed a conversation guide for Princeville called “Homeplace,” which helps flood survivors navigate community discussions about recovery and resilience efforts.
- NCSU, along with the Town of Princeville and several interdisciplinary partners, crafted the Princeville Community Floodprint. Responding to Princeville residents’ desires to adapt in place, the Floodprint plan responds to the reality of living with flood risk while honoring the town’s Black history and character. The document outlines initiatives to manage stormwater, increase public access to the Tar River and convert previously flooded properties to agricultural land.
What is floodprinting?
Floodprinting is a form of landscape planning created by the NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab. Floodprinting allows flood-vulnerable communities to explore the relationship between land and water, with a focus on equity and recovery (Cohen, 2022).
Spotlight on Equity
Princeville is a community with a long and important history. It is the oldest town founded by formerly enslaved people. Today, most town residents are Black. Both the Floodprint and the Homeplace guide aimed to provide a variety of long-term recovery planning options for the Princeville community to consider and select. Because of its rich history of Black leadership, Princeville sought options from which the town could choose, as opposed to recommendations from outsiders for a particular path forward. Academic and nonprofit partners respected this and deferred to the community’s own expertise in developing the Homeplace guide and Floodprint.
In partnership with community members, the floodprint process and final document acknowledge and build upon the place-based history. By improving the material safety of the community and offering new channels for economic growth and recreational space, the plans also strive to improve the day-to-day lives of the residents.
| Key Info | |
|---|---|
| Location | Princeville, N.C. |
| Estimated Costs | ~$300,000 |
| Published | March 1, 2024 |
| Project Contacts |
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| Andrew Fox, PLA, FASLA Professor of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab andrew_fox@ncsu.edu (919) 513-8064 |
| Travis Klondike, PLA, ASLA Assistant Research Professor NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab tmklondi@ncsu.edu (919) 513-8064 |
| Related Resources |
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- In 2017, the Town of Princeville, Edgecombe County, universities and state agencies co-sponsored a multi-day community workshop. The workshop aimed to explore designs for a more flood-resilient Princeville. Designers and planners at the community workshop included NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab faculty, staff and students.
- The NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab, in partnership with the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill, led a team of faculty and students to develop a guide on resilient housing designs for Princeville. NCSU titled Princeville’s guide Homeplace: A Conversation Guide for the Princeville Community, Rebuilding After Hurricane Matthew. “Homeplace” starts by defining key urban planning and resilience concepts and strategies in plain language. The document also describes Princeville's vulnerabilities and its need for resilience planning. The reader can follow different tracks within the guide for different homeowner decisions, for example, if they chose to relocate or elevate. NCSU also published “Homeplace” guides for Fair Bluff, Kinston, Lumberton, Seven Springs and Windsor, N.C.
- The NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab worked with community partners to produce the 2020 Princeville Community Floodprint (PDF). The document responds to the community’s desire to stay in place. It recommends land use strategies that reduce flood risk in addition to acknowledging staffing needs and public safety concerns. The Floodprint also aims to improve the long-term function of ecosystems in areas that routinely flood.
- NC Emergency Management (NCEM) funded the initial community design workshop in Princeville. Funds covered all aspects of preparation and delivery. Leading Black planners, designers and architects from across the state and nation donated tens of thousands of dollars of time.
- The North Carolina Collaboratory funded the Homeplace effort, including all six community documents, with funds upwards of $900,000.
- The $50,000 Floodprint project was funded by the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation of North Carolina through the Common Ground Collaboration, a project of Conservation Trust for North Carolina and The Conservation Fund.
- Workshop: NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab and College of Design, North Carolina Collaboratory, Town of Princeville, Edgecombe County, NCEM, Governor’s Recovery Office
- Princeville’s Homeplace publication: NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab, NCSU College of Design, UNC Chapel Hill Coastal Resilience Center, North Carolina Collaboratory, Design Concepts CLA, Inc., Greenways, Inc.
- Floodprint: NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab, Conservation Trust for North Carolina, Town of Princeville, Upper Coastal Plain Council of Governments
- As of spring 2023, Princeville has generated more than $600,000 in grants for implementing projects in the Floodprint.
- Guided by the Floodprint, the Town of Princeville, Princeville Elementary and their partners constructed a section of the Heritage Walking Trail, installed rain gardens and other stormwater management features to address water runoff from the school building, built an outdoor classroom for teachers and students to incorporate conservation into their lesson plans, and placed a Resilience Corps NC environmental educator to provide additional capacity to the school staff (Conservation Trust for North Carolina, 2022).
When rebuilding in the floodplain is desired by some residents, flood risk minimization is still possible using smart design practices and community-based planning processes.
Community leaders hold essential expertise that technical experts and outsiders do not. Outside groups can partner with communities in a way that advances equity by respecting this expertise and integrating it in plans, committing to the community over several years and helping with the nuts and bolts of project implementation once a plan has been adopted.
Planning efforts that are cross disciplinary rather than only technically focused help build community capacity and result in quality planning outcomes.
Cohen, M. (2022, April 19). New state partnership to support local planning for community resilience. Retrieved from North Carolina State University College of Design: https://design.ncsu.edu/blog/2022/04/19/local-planning-community-resilience/
Conservation Trust for North Carolina. (2022, December 06). Princeville Collaborative. Retrieved from https://ctnc.org/projects/princeville-collaborative/
NCSU Coastal Dynamics Design Lab. (2020, September). Princeville Floodprint: Project Summary. Retrieved from Coastal Dynamics Design Lab: https://www.coastaldynamicsdesignlab.com/princeville-floodprint