The weather event on Monday 28 February 2022 had a significant impact on residents within our City.
It was an intense and very localised rain event, and we have had unofficial reports from residents of between 40mm and 80mm of rain in some areas which would classify this as between a 1 in 50 and 1 in 100 year rain event. Our after hours Rapid Response team responded to 48 calls for assistance on Monday afternoon through to 11.45pm that night to assist our community.
The western/coastal region of the City of Charles Sturt has historically been prone to flooding during severe weather events, however due to urban infill and climate change impacts the risk of flooding to these communities continues to increase. We are aware of these ongoing challenges and the need to improve infrastructure to reduce flood risk and have recently endorsed a Draft Stormwater Management Plan (SMP) for the West Lakes stormwater catchment. The West Lakes catchment is a large area and includes the locations most impacted by the recent floods (refer to image below).
We are planning a number of projects to be delivered over the coming years to ensure that, among other things, the risk of flooding in this area is appropriately managed.
The project that has been identified as the highest priority is the construction of a large detention system within Gleneagles Reserve in Seaton which is a known ‘hotspot’ for flooding within the City of Charles Sturt. This is a large capital project that is likely to be staged over many years based on demand at the time, however preliminary investigations are already in progress and a capital project proposal has been submitted as a part of the current 2022/23 budget process to commence detailed design of the first stage of this project in 2022/23 with the aim of commencing construction in 2023/24. In total, we have allocated $40m in our Long Term Financial Plan over the next 10 years to undertake stormwater management and water quality improvement works within the West Lakes catchment and we look forward to working with our community to deliver these important projects and initiatives.
We are currently seeking feedback on our Draft West Lakes Catchment SMP and encourage anyone with an interest or who is impacted by this process to provide their feedback for consideration. The Final SMP is expected to be submitted to Council for endorsement in mid-2022 to enable high priority works to commence.