PRESS RELEASE IMMEDIATE
15 February 2012Port Road construction blocks Hemmant drainage corridor during Brisbane's wet season.
After taking photographs twelve days apart at Hemmant, the chairperson of The Rivermouth Action Group Inc is calling on the Main Roads Minister to take urgent action to clear all the creeks and drainage channels in the Hemmant/Lytton area where no maintenance has been carried out for over 4 decades to reduce unnecessary local flooding.
A 16th December 2011 letter from the Main Roads Minister Craig Wallace to Paul Lucas said that Lytton Road culverts would be cleaned out by the end of December. This has not taken place. The evidence and correspondence exist on our Group's web site.
"The Consortium of the Port Connect has purposely built a soil barrier in front of the original creek / drainage channel at Hemmant east of the Railway station thus limiting natural drainage and causing increased the duration of flooding for local home owners south of the rail line." Mr Wilson said.
The alternate inadequate drainage channel has blocked and un-maintained culverts. (Photos attached)
Every local resident I have spoken to in the past 2 weeks reported higher than usual flooding during January but were never aware of the many blockages or restriction in the drainage channels the flood waters must try pass through to reach the Brisbane River and Moreton Bay.
Mr Wilson said today that. "After spending six months building a web site to highlight the drainage issues involved at Lytton and Hemmant area no resolution has been forthcoming by either Main Roads, Queensland Transport or the Port of Brisbane Pty Ltd no matter how much encouragement has taken place.
Brisbane City Council has also a part to play in relieving the flooding of local residents but in some cases their work is hampered by the State Government not cleaning out their downstream sections of drainage first.
Our Group's Lytton/Hemmant drainage web site can be found at: http://www.rag.org.au/lytton This web site will continue to be expanded until such time the issue is resolved. Many more drainage issues are involved which are still to be photographed and documented before being added to the web site.
The upgrade of the Port Road has placed 1,000s cubic of metres of fill within the flood plain yet no drainage channel has been cleaned out to enable drainage channels to handle this loss of flood plain capacity which is occurring or has occurred due to Government or private development over the past 40 years. The Port Road will be from a 1/4 to 1/2 a metre higher that the existing Lytton Road which itself has acted as a retention dam across the entire Bulimba, Hemmant and Lindum Creek catchment for over 40 years.
The inadequate drainage of the Lytton area was raised by one local resident in 1999 and again in 2002 with both Paul Lucas and Cr Peter Cummings but no action was ever undertaken. Copies of this correspondence can be found on our group's web site. One response in 1999 from the Brisbane City Council's engineer said that the drainage in this area needed to be cleaned out regularly due to flat grades and slow flows.
The most recent photographs on the web site are reduced/compressed and were taken with 10 megapixel GPS camera in high resolution and video in 1080 HD. Photo are available by email for printing if required. I hold copyright for the majority of the photographs and will make them available for publication relating to exposing this neglect of local drainage.
Some photos have been taken from videos made in 1995, 1997 and 1999 which are on the web site and have all been made into DVD format.
The Flood Commissioner office has recently responded to our Group's submission in a positive manner.
A recent attempt to read a copy of the Port Road Flood Study resulted in Mr Wilson being asked to sign a legal document which prevented him from discussing its contents or showing anyone else the study and if he did so he would be responsible for any court cost and compensation payable which may occur as a result.
Any Media enquires to:
Barry Wilson
Chairperson
The Rivermouth Action Group Inc
P.O. Box 268
MORNINGSIDE Qld 4170
07 3399 6204
0416 564 244
activist@rag.org.au
15 February 2012
