That's possible. I've suspected the death of cities such as Miami will come not from a storm, but rather from loss of insurance on buildings as people realize what the next big storm will do (in 20 years or so)

I'm not sure that's the scenario the OP had in mind though. A realization of crisis could also have the opposite effect. I think our main problem now is that we're not panicking enough. Humans tend to do decently well in crises, often the only time we solve certain problems.