West Palm Beach (Palm Beach County), FL Flood Zone & Drainage Map

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Overview

Where does rainwater drain in Palm Beach County? This interactive map shows surface drainage patterns across West Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Delray Beach, and surrounding areas based on terrain shape - where gravity directs rainwater based on elevation and slope. For official flood risk information, see the FEMA flood zone layer on the Hazards tab.

Palm Beach County stretches from the Atlantic coast to the Everglades, with drainage flowing east through the C-51 and West Palm Beach canals. The western portion borders Lake Okeechobee, where water management decisions affect flood risk countywide. Sandy soils provide better infiltration than South Florida's clay, but the high water table limits absorption capacity. Choose a location to see surface drainage analysis and water flow direction based on terrain shape. The first three locations are free.

Interpretation

Select a location on the map or enter an address to see terrain analysis.

3D Terrain Visualization
Where does rainwater flow based on terrain shape? Blue areas show where water collects and drains downhill.
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Terrain drainage map of Palm Beach County, FL: modeled paths where rainwater runs and collects, from USGS 3DEP elevation data, with the county boundary Click any spot on the map to analyze it
4.0× Horizontal:Vertical
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Palm Beach County flood history

FEMA records 10,758 flood insurance claims in Palm Beach County since 1978, with about $72 million paid. 50% of the claims with a rated flood zone came from moderate- or low-risk zones (X, B or C), outside the high-risk areas on FEMA’s flood maps.

Bar chart of FEMA flood insurance claims per year in Palm Beach County, FL, 1978 to 2026, highest in 2004 (Hurricane Frances) with 1,926 claims.

Biggest flood years

  1. 2004 · Hurricane Frances · 1,926 claims
  2. 1999 · Hurricane Irene · 1,500 claims
  3. 2005 · Hurricane Wilma · 814 claims
  4. 1979 · 726 claims
  5. 1995 · 606 claims

ZIP codes with the most claims

ZIPClaimsShare
334801,35412.6%
334285595.2%
334335034.7%
334354504.2%
334104013.7%
334453953.7%
334623863.6%
334833803.5%

Managed farmland. Much of western Palm Beach County is farmland in the Everglades Agricultural Area, kept dry by a system of canals, levees and pump stations. On the terrain map these low fields show as standing water, because elevation data alone can’t see that system.

How to read this. These are National Flood Insurance Program claims, so they count only insured buildings and miss flooding where owners had no flood insurance. FEMA publishes them without names or addresses: they show which years and areas flooded, never whether a particular house did. ZIP codes are as reported on the claims, and a ZIP code can extend beyond the county. The “rated” flood zone is the one used to price the policy and may come from an older map. Data as of 2026-09-08, from FEMA OpenFEMA.

Next: look up the flood zone for an address · how to check whether a specific house has flooded · why Zone X can still flood · how to read the drainage map

Sunlight and soil in Palm Beach County

Sunlight. Ground here gets about 5.2 kWh of sunlight per square meter per day on average (5.0 to 5.3 across the map), above the middle of the lower 48 (4.5). South-facing slopes get more, north-facing ones less.

Soil. The ground is mostly loamy soil (Cambisols 37%, Phaeozems 6%), with thin soil over rock (Leptosols 30%). Rain soaks in at a moderate rate.

The Solar and Soil tabs on the map above show both for any address. Read more: how much sun does my property get? · what soil type is my property, and how it affects drainage

Sunlight: long-term average on flat ground from the National Solar Radiation Database (National Laboratory of the Rockies, formerly NREL). Soil: most likely soil types from ISRIC SoilGrids, a 250 m model, not a survey of any lot. Both cover the map area above.

Explore more flood and drainage maps

Browse all 64 flood and drainage maps · Flood insurance claims in the 50 largest cities · How Terreflow uses terrain and FEMA data