Burlington neighbourhood worries heavy rains too much for local culvert

A Burlington man says he and people in his neighbourhood are on edge about flooding in his area due to a culvert.

Residents are expressing concerns despite the city cleaning up around the creek last week.

Paul Kourie lives in the area near Headon Forest Drive and Headon Road close to a culvert that dents to flood when there’s a lot of rain.

Last week, the city took action by removing some of the metal bars from the grate to help debris flow through.

Kourie says the changes are a temporary fix, “it gets fed by another branch that goes under Dundas there, so unless they clean the culvert all the way back and remove the big, huge pieces of debris that, if you go there, you can see there’s big logs and big branches.”

“If they don’t maintain it from here all the way back, then yeah, I don’t think that’s enough and if it’s not going to be enough, then we really expect them to remove that grate entirely,” he said.

Changes were made to the culvert grate before the rainfall over the weekend, as Julie Savage, who also lives in the area, says she’s seen the positive impact of the modifications.

“The city came just before the rain on the weekend, and they went in and they cut sort of the grates, so that there’s more room between grates to go through, and there was no problem on the weekend,” she said.

But the area has a history of overflow issues as just two weeks ago another flood happened, and it’s not the only creek in the area that tends to flood.

Savage said the creek off of Berkshire Lane was significantly affected from the recent rain, “and now this is what it looks like when it hasn’t been maintained.”

She pointed out that two weeks ago the water was overflowing.

A statement from the City of Burlington to CHCH News says it is actively working on a culvert redesign, which reads “once the design is complete, technical drawings will be created and the process of hiring a contractor to manufacture and install the new grate will begin. We anticipate that the new grate will be fully installed by the end of summer.”

Conservation Halton is asking all residents and children to keep a safe distance from all watercourses and structures – such as bridges, culverts and dams – saying that closeness to elevated water levels is extremely dangerous.

With more rain expected on Wednesday, Kourie says this week will be a test to see how the changes to the culvert will work.

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