Floodplain Administration

flood insurance

National Flood Insurance Program
The City of Grapevine is a participating city of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP). Ordinances are in place that govern and restrict development within the NFIP effective floodplain. In response to rising costs of taxpayer funded disaster relief, the NFIP was developed to provide homeowners affordable insurance to protect against flood losses based on their potential risk of flooding.
floodplain

Floodplain Boundaries
Lending institutions determine whether a property is within or outside of the NFIP floodplain boundary by using Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs). The City of Grapevine has the effective maps on file for review. These maps are legal documents and may or may not represent actual conditions. If there are discrepancies in regards to a mapped floodplain and actual conditions that a property owner wishes to explore there are means to contest the findings.
FIRMette
A FIRMette is a full-scale section of a FEMA Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM) that you create online and are formatted to fit on printers commonly found in homes and offices.
Lake Grapevine

Master Drainage Plan
The City of Grapevine, under direction of its City Council, developed a master drainage plan which examined all storm drain systems and channels within the city for ultimate developed flow-rates in anticipation of future development occurring within the City and upstream. Ultimate developed flow-rates look at the entire watershed (area draining to a point) as though completely developed.
Development
The City requires all development to meet not only the FEMA NFIP criteria, but also the ultimate condition flowrate floodplains on file with Public Works.

Any development (Manmade changes including fill, excavation, fences, pools, habitable structures, etc.) within either the master drain plan or NFIP floodplain must complete a floodplain development permit and may be required to submit a full hydrologic and hydraulic analysis depending on the potential impact and location.
Grapevine Lake
Grapevine Lake is a flood control structure and therefore has additional development criteria. For any changes adjacent to the Lake, the US Army Corps of Engineers must by contacted in addition to the regular City permits.

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