More wet weather on the way; City of Vancouver needs your help to prevent more flooding

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – As the Lower Mainland recovers from last night’s intense downpours and flooding, the City of Vancouver is already looking ahead to the next weather systems this week.

The head of engineering is asking people to help clear their catch basins.

That’s one of the reasons we saw so many roadways and sidewalks flooded. About 25 mm of rain came down in a short period of time Sunday night. Drain pipes were also overwhelmed.

RELATED: Flood evacuations scaled back in southern B.C., but flooding risk still high

“We received over 128 calls for flooding,” Jerry Dobrovony says. “As soon as it became clear that the rain was going to be much heavier, we diverted our evening crews, our graveyard crew that are normally emptying garbage cans throughout the city, they were all diverted and allocated full time to doing flooding.”

He says additional staff and equipment, including more pumps, were brought in Sunday night to help deal with water volumes.

With more storms expected this week, Dobrovony is putting out a plea to residents and business to help, “If they’re walking past a catch basin and they see that it’s plugged, just kick aside the handful of leaves that are blocking it.”

He says with so many leaves still yet to fall, it really helps all the crews called in to respond to flooding get things cleared more quickly.

Dobrovolny adds there is also a maximum $10,000 fine for anyone caught blowing leaves from their yard into the street.

“I’m very concerned about people blowing their leaves out onto the street, don’t do it,” he says. “We offer a variety of different ways for people to dispose of their leaves.”

He says the city spends more than a million dollars every year picking up leaves.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today