THUNDER BAY — Significant flooding impacted several homes and businesses early Sunday morning in the Fort William Road area.
On Monday, the road was reduced to a single lane of traffic in each direction between First Avenue and Water Street — motorists are encouraged to avoid the area.
City staff believe a water main break caused the flooding, which on Sunday covered much of the largely residential First Avenue, parts of Ontario Street and the area around the Roots Community Food Centre and Moose Hall.
A high water line could also be seen more than a foot up the fence of one home on Ontario Street.
As of Monday morning, the cause of the break was unknown and city workers were still investigating.
"Our staff were working through the night to get that section isolated and get the leak under control. We have crews on site today to locate the source of the leak and excavate and repair," said David Warwick, the superintendent for water distribution and wastewater collection, in an interview on Monday morning.
While under control now, he added that the storm sewer lift station will still be working to drain the area and pump everything up into the floodway.
First Avenue resident Dean Hauth said he was awoken around 5 a.m. by a neighbour alerting him to the flooding.
Although water levels were brought under control, Hauth has ongoing concerns about the maintenance and monitoring of the floodway, which runs near his home.
"As we started talking to other neighbours and looking around and realizing the massive scope of this, there seems to be more at play than just a broken water main here," said Hauth.
He said he and his family have dealt with flooding in the neighbourhood several times before and feels there's a lack of attention paid to the conditions in the floodway: “Nobody’s paying attention.”
“You just have to stop and look. I mean, you can see it’s full of water. It’s February. There should be no water in there. There’s been no melting. There’s been no rain or precipitation,” said Hauth.
“So that spillway should be empty. And it’s overflowing and it’s flowing into the neighbourhood surrounding houses and destroying property.”
Hauth explained that he wants to see the city check the water levels in the floodway frequently, every other day, and make physical infrastructure improvements.
“The spillway needs to be deeper (and) wider and the culverts need to be improved that go under Fort William Road. There needs to be a greater water flow," said Hauth.
"The last five years, they’ve had to come every year and dig the ice off the spillway to prevent the neighbourhood from flooding completely, so there needs to be a permanent solution."
The city already has good monitoring, said Warwick. He said the Bare Point Water Treatment Plant detects large breaks. In this case, he explained that the system notified the city that the plant was losing capacity and they dispatched staff to locate the issue.
The water main was built around the 1960s, added Warwick, but he said it was too early to say whether the age of the infrastructure was a factor in the leak.
Erin Beagle, the Roots Community Food Centre's executive director, came to work at 10 a.m. on Sunday to find city vehicles at the centre.
“What they told me was a water main had broken and really done a lot of water on First Avenue and all through here and they were still looking for the source of it at that point,” said Beagle.
“Only our dining room has been affected, but water came right in and just sort of washed all over the dining room,” she added.
Beagle said their insurance company acted quickly and sent a contractor to clean up inside. The centre also had the parking lot plowed for the safety of people walking in.
“We really want to limit how much damage happens to the building because of moisture and water because there are a lot of things that happen here. Like tomorrow, we’re running an all-day ID clinic, so people can come in and get replacement birth certificates and on Wednesday, we have our senior’s meal,” said Beagle.
She added that they are quite hopeful that by Wednesday, when they’re having a meal again, the flooding will be no problem and everybody will be welcome.
“We love our building and we just need to make sure that it is still in good order for the community to come and use,” said Beagle.
If residents in the area experience discoloured water or a decrease in water pressure during the repair process, the city recommends running a cold water tap as close to the water meter as possible for around 10 to 15 minutes or until the water runs clear.
