Council’s program of drainage maintenance got underway in Mullumbimby this week and every drain will be inspected and assessed for urgent repairs and maintenance.
Council crews will be moving around Mullumbimby as follows:
• October/November – Mullumbimby East
• November – Mullumbimby North
• November/December – Mullumbimby South.
“We’ve heard and we understand the community’s concerns around drainage and we’ll be moving methodically around Mullumbimby in October, November and early-December to look at every drain and assess and triage repairs and maintenance,” Council’s Director Infrastructure Services, Phil Holloway said.
“In addition, our crews are also doing a visual inspection of the underground piped network so we can look for any sediment blockages and remove them,” he said.
“We hope this gives the community some reassurance that Council is taking action on drainage in Mullumbimby and keeping up maintenance and making improvements to the network will remain a priority for us over the longer-term,” Mr Holloway said.
“At any given time, Council has two streams of drainage works going on including immediate repairs and maintenance works in response to blockages and breakages which in times of flooding can result in huge volumes of work, and our ongoing schedule of upgrades and improvements. These are mostly grant funded and require larger-scale project management over months and years.
“It’s also important for the community to understand that urban drains are not designed to cope with the force and quantity of water that we experienced during this year’s floods. The sheer volume of rain meant that no drains were able to cope.”
Council has applied for a grant from the NSW Government to fund an Overland Flow Path Study. As the name suggests this study will look beyond the flooding of creeks and rivers to the flow of floodwater across the landscape and will assess the capacity of infrastructure in the shire (drains, bridges etc) and the results will then be used to prioritise and seek funding for the upgrade infrastructure as part of the Stormwater Capital Works program.
