Flood shows 'something wrong with infrastructure'

A City Care worker digs up the pavement at the corner of Forbury Rd and Sandringham St to allow...
A City Care worker digs up the pavement at the corner of Forbury Rd and Sandringham St to allow repairs to a damaged wastewater pipe which caused surface flooding during heavy rain at the weekend. PHOTO: GREGOR RICHARDSON
Short-term flood relief cannot come soon enough for some South Dunedin residents after more properties were flooded during heavy rain at the weekend.

Parts of Forbury Rd and surrounding streets were flooded early on Monday morning after a section of stormwater pipe running along the road was damaged.

Water also entered some properties between Coughtrey St and Albert St.

Greater South Dunedin Action Group president Ray Macleod said the latest flood proved something needed to be done about the wastewater infrastructure as soon as possible.

"It's clear there's something wrong with the infrastructure - we're having flooding events every couple of months now."

In its draft 10-year plan the Dunedin City Council has budgeted about $35million to improve the stormwater network in South Dunedin, but physical work is not expected to begin for at least three years.

Council chief executive Sue Bidrose has said the council would study potential short-term solutions which could be used until more extensive work started.

A public meeting will be held sometime in June to update residents on any potential short and long-term plans for the flooding problem, but a date has not been confirmed.

Mr Macleod said there was a feeling among the community its concerns were finally being listened to, but there had to be progress soon.

The action group had considered taking its concerns about repeated storm- and wastewater contamination in the area to the health authorities, he said.

"It's a Third World situation in a First World city."

Council 3 Waters group manager Tom Dyer was unavailable yesterday but earlier in the week he told the Otago Daily Times that while the stormwater system in the Forbury Rd area was old, there was no particular issue with it.

The flooding on Monday was caused by a small section of damaged pipe at the corner of Forbury Rd and Sandringham St, Mr Dyer said.

It was the second time this year the pipe had been damaged and council staff would investigate if more significant work was needed to stop that recurring.

Comments

Too busy building cycle lanes to fix up the infrastructure of this city, can't waste money on a bit of flooding when there are properties to buy with other peoples money.

 

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