The Flood Mitigation Office is hosting several neighbourhood information sessions to address how the proposed changes to both the Municipal Development Plan (MDP) and Land Use Bylaw (LUB) will impact the ongoing efforts of the office and overall growth of the Drumheller Valley.
The community information sessions started in Wayne at the Last Chance Saloon on Wednesday, October 14 and will continue with the last session scheduled for Tuesday, October 27 at the Newcastle Community Hall.
“We started on this in the spring of 2020,” Darwin Durnie, Chief Resiliency and Flood Mitigation Officer, said during the Thursday, October 15 session at the Badlands Community Facility. “Here we are in October with the public hearing set at council for October 26.”
The information sessions are not to discuss impacts to individual property owners as the information is not currently available. Discussions are focused on ongoing flood mitigation efforts and how any amendments to the MDP and LUB will impact the community at large and the eight steps to changing the channel on flood mitigation and readiness.
One of the efforts to protect neighbourhoods is constructing berms and dikes which will allow for an adaptive protection system.
The current design of these protective systems do not allow effective adaptation in the event of more serious flood events, such as those in 2005 and 2013.
Durnie explained the dikes would be designed to withstand a capacity of approximately 1,800 cubic metres per second of flow but could be adapted to handle higher flows as needed. Peak river flow during the 2013 flood was approximately 1,322 cubic metres per second, well below the projected design for the new systems.
“We’re going to make the tops (of the berms) six metres wide so we can rapidly haul earth on and adapt the dike,” Durnie said.
He added, “We need to establish protection for about 1,500 homes in the valley that is robust enough so we can go back to the insurance companies and say ‘This is protected so please keep insuring these properties.’”
Changes to the MDP and LUB will help push growth into these protected zones while protecting the unique landscape of the Badlands. Reducing the current 21 land use discretions will also help streamline development applications and attract developers to the area.
A public hearing regarding the proposed amendments to the MDP and LUB is scheduled for Monday, October 26 ahead of the regular council meeting.
