The damage caused by Superstorm Sandy was unprecedented, but it wasn’t unpredictable.

For decades, academics and experts had warned that a big hurricane could wreak serious havoc on the New York metropolitan area. In 1978, a New York state committee on disaster preparedness concluded that New York City was particularly vulnerable if the right kind of storm struck.

But those warnings were never heeded.

Now experts say that as global temperatures increase, it isn’t a question of if but when another Sandy-like storm will hit. And while most everyone agrees dramatic steps need to be taken to secure the Northeast — from building sea walls and beach berms to ceding entire neighborhoods back to nature — very few seem to know exactly how or when those goals will be accomplished.

That’s because the multibillion dollar plans to ensure the resiliency of the coast hinge on entities that have proved resistant to spending and change: the United States government and the American people.

“The places that got hit, everyone knew they were vulnerable. They’d flood even during minor storms,” said Richard Flanagan, a professor of political science at the College of Staten Island. “The problem is the lack of will to get things done.”

Flanagan has been working with a team of researchers to study storm-surge scenarios on Staten Island for more than four years. The year before Sandy hit, one of Flanagan’s colleagues published a paper that predicted — with an eerie level of accuracy — which areas were most vulnerable if a Sandy-like storm were to hit.

Unfortunately, the researchers were proved right when Sandy flooded the south and east shores of Staten Island, destroying thousands of homes and killing at least 23 people.