Tuesday, 22 March 2011

The great flood !

Yesterday Albion Park and the southern suburbs of Wollongong got the greatest drenching since the calamity of the 1998 flood rains. Roads were cut - there were landslides - the trains stopped running - homes were flooded and cars inundated.

Mother Nature went on the rampage and delivered months of rain in just a few hours - and we should use this experience to live and learn.

We are about to release huge tracts of land at Calderwood and west Dapto for new housing. Now would be a good time to see how this land was affected by yesterdays event - and how it's servicing by road and rail would suffer in a similar event.

If we are not careful we will set in motion a future financial disaster. If we allow people to build on a flood plain there will be times when their losses will impact on insurance rates - and inevitably there will be uninsured people who will need help from the public purse.

What happened yesterday should guide the regulations that govern what type of housing should be permitted in a known flood area. Perhaps elevated housing should be mandatory. More expensive to build in the first place, but flood free until the waters subside.

It would be tragic if yesterday's lesson went unheeded - and certainly the flooding of the only access road should deliver a clear message on the need for a flood free access.

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