We went to Cedar Rapids this summer to see Sol's family and decided to drive around to see the flood damage. We were very surprised. One year later and the city is in much better shape, but still has a long way to go. Here are some of the things we saw...
We saw several homes that had something spray painted on it. These are some of the ways people expressed themselves during this difficult time.
This mini van has definitely seen better days! I could not believe that this was still sitting this way a year after the fact. 
This picture also was intriguing because the garage wrapped around the tree didn't match any of the nearby homes, indicating that the current swept it away from it's original location and landed it here.
Due to problems with the sewers, the city had to bring in porta-potties. There were still a handful through out the city and if you look behind the porta-potty, the empty lot used to be a home that has been torn down. As you drove through the city there were different colored notices posted to the exteriors. Yellow and Green (if I remember correctly) meant that there was minimal damage, but Red meant that the home could no longer be used. This may have been one of the red homes.
This is one of the better pictures actually showing the water line. It is a business near the river.
It was difficult to know the stories behind all the homes, but this one appears to have been stripped of everything. It is hard to know if the owner was trying to dry it out before rebuilding or if they are in the process of tearing it down.
This picture shows a spray painted line of where the water was at it's peak. In the picture is a 15 passenger van and if you look closely, you can see the water line above the van.
We saw several homes that had something spray painted on it. These are some of the ways people expressed themselves during this difficult time.
This mini van has definitely seen better days! I could not believe that this was still sitting this way a year after the fact.
This picture also was intriguing because the garage wrapped around the tree didn't match any of the nearby homes, indicating that the current swept it away from it's original location and landed it here.
Due to problems with the sewers, the city had to bring in porta-potties. There were still a handful through out the city and if you look behind the porta-potty, the empty lot used to be a home that has been torn down. As you drove through the city there were different colored notices posted to the exteriors. Yellow and Green (if I remember correctly) meant that there was minimal damage, but Red meant that the home could no longer be used. This may have been one of the red homes. This is one of the better pictures actually showing the water line. It is a business near the river.
It was difficult to know the stories behind all the homes, but this one appears to have been stripped of everything. It is hard to know if the owner was trying to dry it out before rebuilding or if they are in the process of tearing it down.This one caught my eye because you can see the water line pretty well, but also the American Flag was still flying! There were a lot of homes that put up flags. This one, however, looked as though it went through the storm.
It was neat to see the response of the Iowan people. They are very resilient and will prevail!
