City of Knoxville
Engineering Department
Stormwater Engineering Division

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) operates the National Flood Insurance Program for communities to establish floodplains and qualify for reduced flood insurance rates. The City of Knoxville (Community 475434) has been a participant in this FEMA program since 1971. The primary requirement is to identify and protect floodplains in order to reduce severe flooding.

For more information, see FEMA webpages entitled:

FEMA Library
Flood: Are You Protected From The Next Disaster
Floodplain Management Publications
Floodplain Management Summary
Policy & Claim Statistics for Flood Insurance
FEMA Map Service Center

Also see FloodSmart.gov - An Official Site of the National Flood Insurance Program webpages entitled:

Resources: Flood Facts
Policies & Coverage Information
Flood Insurance: Types of Policies
Benefits of Flood Insurance
What's Your Flood Risk
Tips for Handling Your Flood Insurance Claim

The current ordinance for floodplain management (Chapter 12 of the City Code - Flood Damage Prevention and Control Ordinance) has been in effect since 1990 and is available as part of Appendix B of the Land Development Manual. This ordinance is a revised version of the earlier floodplain regulations within the City Code of 1962. Commonly used terms (such as floodplain and floodway) are illustrated in Chapter 11 of the Land Development Manual. The City of Knoxville defines the regulatory floodway as the 500-year flood, which is stricter than the national FEMA requirement of a 100-year floodway.

There are almost 300 communities from Tennessee that participate in the NFIP, including the neighboring entities of Farragut (Community 470387) and Knox County (Community 475433). FEMA guidelines strictly regulate any form of construction or development within a regulatory floodplain. A developer must demonstrate that there are no impacts to the flood water surface elevations, using FEMA application forms and analysis requirements as shown on the FEMA website. For this reason, it is very difficult and costly to develop within or near a floodplain. In addition to FEMA requirements, any proposed work within a stream typically requires permits from TDEC and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

For a general understanding of how buffer zones and no-fill areas relate to FEMA flood boundaries, click here to view a Floodplain Cross-Sectional Diagram.

Each participating NFIP community is rated on a scale from 10 (no flood insurance discount) down to 1 (45% flood insurance discount). Nationwide, there are less than 1000 communities that qualify for an insurance discount, as shown on FEMA's Community Rating System webpage. Currently the City of Knoxville is a Class 8 (10% discount rate) community.

TVA prepared and submitted an updated Flood Insurance Study for the City of Knoxville to FEMA for review and approval. FEMA has approved this study and the updated maps and profiles will become effective on May 2, 2007. The newer TVA study included updated HEC-RAS water surface profiles and digital mapping has been integrated into KGIS, the geographic information system jointly funded by Knox County, the City of Knoxville, and the Knoxville Utilities Board.

FLOOD INSURANCE RATE MAP PROFILES

The Flood Insurance profiles can be viewed using the following links:

FLOOD INSURANCE STUDY-Table of Contents for Volumes 1 through 4

FLOOD INSURANCE STUDY- Volume 1 of 4

FLOOD INSURANCE STUDY - Volume 2 of 4

FLOOD INSURANCE STUDY - Volume 3 of 4

FLOOD INSURANCE STUDY - Volume 4 of 4

Flood insurance information can be viewed online and/or purchased inexpensively through the FEMA Map Service Center or viewed at the offices of the Stormwater Engineering Division (Suite 480 in the City County Building). The following Adobe Reader PDF file can assist in viewing/printing/ordering the types of online FEMA map products:  MSC-instructions.pdf (532 kB, 6 pages)