A builder of custom homes in Southern California is in the process of developing plans for the construction of several high end houses in the San Gabriel Mountains. The sites of the homes are in hilly terrain and work on all of these properties will begin this June and take approximately five years to complete.
Although the drainage he will be designing both for the homes and the property that they are on will be more than adequate to handle even the 1000 year rainfall event, he is concerned about construction delays that might occur due to rainfall over the next several years. During construction, access roads will not be paved, and there will be no vegetation to stabilize soils.
The builder has read that scientists have determined that rainfall fluctuations over Southern California, including the San Gabriel Mountains, seem statistically directly related to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), and that since PDO indices have been negative and are expected to continue to be so for the next five years or so, that sub-average precipitation can be expected during the same period. The same report seems to downplay the relationship of El Niño to precipitation in Southern California as dominant in the precipitation signal there.
Since this implies that the builder will have to be less concerned about erosion on the side, or access issues due to road washouts, he is interested in hiring a consulting meteorologist:
1. to determine if news reports about the PDO (and El Niño) and expected rainfall in Southern California are characterizing the findings of the science with regard to these issues correctly; and
2. he would also like the consultant to give him his or her views on these issues with respect to his planned construction timetable.
