“five of the most intense rainstorms in New York City’s history have taken place in the last four years”

— Rohit Aggarwala, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection, in July 2025

Frequently Asked Questions

  • A cloudburst is a sudden, heavy downpour where a large amount of rain falls in a short time, often overwhelming streets and drains. Cities like New York use “cloudburst management” to reduce flooding by combining grey infrastructure (like sewer pipes and underground storage tanks) with green infrastructure (like trees and rain gardens). These systems help absorb, store, and redirect stormwater, protecting neighborhoods from damage.

    For more information, see the NYC Environmental Protection Cloudburst Management page.

  • The 2024 New York State Climate Impacts Assessment projects that annual precipitation in New York City will increase by 4–11% by the 2050s and 7–17% by the 2080s. This will mean more frequent flooding, including in areas that are not coastal and have not previously been vulnerable.

    Current monitoring systems don’t capture what happens at the neighborhood or block level, leaving important local impacts undocumented. Community-collected data helps fill this gap, providing a clearer picture of where and how flooding is happening across the city.

  • We are building an API for researchers, emergency responders, community-based organizations, public agencies, and data analytics companies to access and license hyperlocal flood documentation data. We only partner with organizations we believe are acting in the best interest of communities—particularly environmental justice communities—to ensure this data strengthens local resilience efforts.

    Our current focus is on New York City, where we are working to fill critical flood data gaps at the neighborhood level. At the same time, we are always open to conversations with partners in other cities and regions who share our commitment to community-driven data and equitable climate resilience.

    Our team brings backgrounds in city planning, climate adaptation, economic development, and community engagement, and we work alongside a network of experts in spatial data science, water management, and related fields. We collaborate with engineering firms, city agencies, and grassroots organizations to design data collection processes that are both rigorous and community-engaged.

  • When heavy rain is in the forecast, residents get a simple alert inviting them to share photos of what they see on their block. Those photos are time-stamped and geotagged, turning everyday observations into reliable records of flooding that big systems, like satellites or aerial surveys, often miss.

    By starting with what people notice in their own neighborhoods, we’re building data from the ground up. The process not only creates better information for planning and recovery, it also opens up conversations about local climate risks and how communities can prepare together.

    Cloudburst Collective is the first project of GROUND3D. We see it as the beginning of a larger movement—demonstrating that data can be collected in ways that are non-extractive and community-driven, and showing how a decentralized network of residents on the ground can be activated to document climate events that are becoming more common. At its core, we believe closing climate data gaps requires collective effort—and that it has the power to create collective value.

  • Residents benefit through stronger advocacy, quicker recovery support, and more resilient planning. Cities gain real-time insights to improve infrastructure and emergency response.

    We’ll never sell your personal info. Your phone number and email stay private. If your photos are used, it’s only shared—with no personal details attached—with trusted partners who we believe are working to make communities in NYC safer from flooding. If data is ever licensed, we believe contributors should be fairly compensated.

  • Sign up to receive texts so you can contribute photos during rainfall events, get notified about upcoming workshops, and join the waitlist for our app. Every submission strengthens neighborhood resilience and helps create a more complete picture of flooding in our communities.

    If you are interested in accessing hyperlocal flood documentation, reach out to info@cloudburst-collective.xyz