ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (WFLA) — St. Petersburg has approved the start of a study of a flood gate system to help manage flooding throughout the city.

The city would install two flood gates in the Shore Acres neighborhood. Amy Cardy shared video of the flooding in the cul-de-sac leading up to her home during the hurricanes last year.

“Just a dash of PTSD,” Cardy said jokingly.

She can laugh about it now, but said she witnessed devastation in her neighborhood, and her own home was flooded. Cardy said it will never feel like normal and will keep being unpredictable unless the city does something about its stormwater system.

“There’s still a lot of anger aimed at our local government,” she said when asked about the temperature of residents in Shore Acres.

Thursday, city leaders approved a plan to study the potential for a flood gate system in Shore Acres. Just to do the study is nearly $150,000.

“This will bring relief to just a phenomenal amount of people,” said city councilmember Mike Harting.

The tidal gates will help enhance the capacity of handling water flow and flushing during rainfall and high tide events. Engineers realize the use of the flood gates will have to be evaluated.

“Want to make sure we don’t adversely impact another community. We don’t want to push the problem from one spot to another,” said Brejesh Prayman, the Director of Engineering and Capital Improvements.

City leaders said the project could benefit a quarter of the entire city, not just Shore Acres.

Cardy said it feels like the 2024 hurricanes were just a month ago. She hopes there is some relief coming from the city’s efforts.

“I think it’s kind of overdue. We should have been having these conversations a long time ago and honestly, but we’re having them now. So concentrating on the positive,” Cardy said.

City leaders said for every six inches of water body impacting Shore Acres, there would be 52 million gallons of storage capacity. So during a major rain event, the gates would close and possibly deter sewage from impacting a residential area.