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The town of Chelsea, Que., has issued a state of emergency after Friday’s heavy rainfall.
The state of emergency will last 48 hours from about 9 a.m. Saturday, the municipality’s mayor, Pierre Guénard, said in a video posted to Facebook.
It will allow emergency crews to respond to the damage quickly, Guénard said.
“We still have many residents that are cut off — their road has been literally cut in half,” Guénard said in the video.
He’s calling for residents to be respectful of workers and heavy machinery on municipal roads.
The intense rainfall faced by the area was leftover from the tropical storm Debby.
In neighbouring Gatineau, Que., Environment Canada had recorded 83 millimetres of rain by 5 p.m. Friday, blowing past the city’s previous Aug. 9 rain record set in 1959 of roughly 43 millimetres. An overall rainfall total for Friday wasn’t immediately available.
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The rain has meant Gatineau Park’s parkway network is closed to motor vehicles, according to the National Capital Commission (NCC).
Shuttle service has been suspended for the remainder of the weekend.
While the Fortune and Gatineau parkways are open to cyclists and pedestrians, the Champlain Parkway is closed to all visitors due to collapsed pavement.
In a statement Saturday afternoon, the NCC said they recommend the public stay off all Gatineau Park trails for now as crews are still assessing the damage.
Trail 5 is closed due to a large sinkhole, they added.
Roads still closed in Ottawa
Ottawa also set a daily rainfall record Friday with 45.3 millimetres.
As of 5 p.m. Saturday, five roads remained closed in the city due to the flooding, according to a memo from city staff to council:
Steacie Drive between Teron Road and Alfred Casson Way.
Old Second Line Road between Thomas A. Dolan Parkway and Murphy Side Road.
Marchurst Road at Murphy Side Road.
March Road at Carp Road.
Old Maple Lane between Thomas A. Dolan Parkway and Strode Avenue.
All of those locations were deemed to be “stable” following inspections, wrote acting general manager of public works Quentin Levesque and acting general manager of infrastructure and water services Carina Duclos in the memo.
The city doesn’t believe any of those sites will get worse, Duclos and Levesque added. People can check the city’s interactive traffic map for updates, they said.
“The immediate focus is on reinstating laneways in the Carp Village area, improving access to homes, addressing priority shoulder work on critical roads and conducting early culvert repairs,” their memo said.
West Carleton-March Coun. Clarke Kelly said the rain had a major impact, with residents in his ward dealing with flooded basements and washed-out driveways.
“We’re used to the springtime flooding that sometimes happens along the rivers … but what we saw here yesterday in terms of flooding being caused by rain, I’ve never seen that before,” he said.
Kelly said the city is working to restore culverts and remove debris so that residents can get in and out of their driveways. He anticipated the affected roads would remain closed for 36-48 hours from Saturday afternoon.
Staff in the infrastructure, water services and public works departments at the City of Ottawa are doing a full evaluation of the infrastructure needs in in the area, Kelly added.
“If this is going to be the new normal, then I think we better focus quickly on expanding that infrastructure and getting ready for more rain in the future,” he said.
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Kelly said anyone in his ward who needs assistance should reach out to his office or the city.
Residents who’ve had their basements flood should report the situation for inspection by calling 311, Duclos and Levesque wrote in their memo.
Source: cbc
