With rain in the forecast for Montreal, Pointe-Claire residents are worried about flooding.
While they’re still recovering from the last flood — on June 20 — residents say they are bracing for more.
“I gotta stay home because they’re calling for rain,” said Roy Halpin, who expressed his concern about the wet weather.
Halpin installed an additional sump pump in the hope that it will prevent the water from entering into his property.
And Halpin’s hardly the only Pointe-Claire resident taking matters into his own hands.
His neighbour has also installed a barrier. He has three windows in his basement but he only added barriers on two, costing him around $10,000, which he paid for out of pocket.
The City of Pointe-Claire is trying to come up with its own solutions. Officials there say they have 11 climate-resilience infrastructure projects coming up during the next two years, which will be funded by a $6.8 million provincial grant.
The first project on that list is a sponge park. The city is going to transform the soccer field on Saddlewood Avenue into a sponge park that will be able to hold up to 3.77 million litres of water — the equivalent of one-and-a-half Olympic-size swimming pools.
“There’s anxiety out there, which I get,” said Pointe-Claire Mayor John Belvedere.
The mayor says Pointe-Claire has made it a priority to address the flooding, and officials came up with a financial plan to help residents.
“We’re helping people make their house more waterproof,” Belvedere said. “We are willing to give up to $5,000 to add a sump pump and French drains to make your house more water resilient. The program was only supposed to come out in September but we expedited it and it came out last month with about 7,580 changes to 75 to 80 application already.”
Some residents are glad to see action from the city, but their fear is still present.
“Let’s see what this does over time,” said Halpin. “I think the jury is still out. And we’ll see next time we get hit hard if it reacts well. But it’s underneath that’s the problem, it’s not surface.”
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