Flood barriers and panels in Boca Raton

Who this is for

Owners whose doors or garage sit close to the water level at king tides or in storm surge.

A 25% flood insurance discount

Boca Raton says its floodplain management currently qualifies residents for a 25% discount on flood insurance premiums, and the City recommends flood cover whether or not a home is in a Special Flood Hazard Area. New flood policies usually take 30 days to start, so owners buy cover before hurricane season, not during a storm watch.

Barriers are sized to the flood level for your zone, and residential homes cannot rely on dry floodproofing below the base flood elevation.[1]

Designed for 12 to 18 more inches

The same manual asks for seawalls designed to take an added 12 to 18 in of height later without alteration. That sizes the piles, panels and tiebacks today for a raise the owner may only pay for in ten or twenty years.

Barriers and a raised wall work together: one at the property edge, one at the doors.[2]

Tide on Lake Boca Raton

NOAA's Lake Boca Raton gauge, just inside Boca Inlet, records a 2.19 ft mean range and a 2.47 ft great diurnal range (1983 to 2001 epoch). With the dock band set in NAVD88 and the tide close to the inlet's, lift and float travel is planned from these numbers.

King tides show how often barriers will need to go up.[3]

What makes Boca Raton different

Plan review needs a current-conditions survey showing the seawall wet face or bulkhead line, the property line and piles, section details with the finished cap elevation, and a proposed site plan. Inspections are staged: a location survey before the cap is poured and before the structural cap and piling inspections, a final engineer report on cap elevation with photos, and a final marine structure survey for docks and lifts.[4]

Agencies beyond the City

Palm Beach County's marine structure checklist for unincorporated areas lists the outside approvals agencies expect to see: FDEP, the Florida Inland Navigation District (FIND) and the Army Corps, as applicable. That checklist is dated 2005, so we confirm current requirements for each job. The federal seagrass range used in dock design covers Palm Beach County waters.[5][6]

Permits in Boca Raton

• City of Boca Raton Development Services: Marine structure permits under City Code Chapter 22, with staged survey and engineer inspections.
• Florida Inland Navigation District (FIND): May be involved for work along the Intracoastal Waterway.
• Florida DEP or South Florida Water Management District: State permit or exemption for docks, walls and lifts on Lake Boca Raton and the Intracoastal Waterway.
• US Army Corps of Engineers, Jacksonville District: Federal authorisation along the Intracoastal, which the Palm Beach County checklist expects to see with the building permit.

What we fit

• Removable aluminium panels in side tracks
• Barriers for garage openings
• Seals and storage racks
• A deployment plan so you can put them up quickly

What barriers can and cannot do

Barriers protect openings. They do not stop water rising through the ground, which Miami Beach notes comes up through porous limestone, and they do not replace elevation or flood vents under the NFIP.[8][7]

Frequently asked questions