Kramberger: Room for improvement in revised flood maps!
17 Jul 2019
While some inaccuracies were corrected for local municipalities along Lac St-Louis in the revised flood zone maps released by Quebec’s Municipal Affairs Ministry on Monday, it’s not all good news.
The mayors of Beaconsfield and Dorval are shocked sections of homes in their cities remain in a 20-year flood plain — although none of these residences were flooded in spring 2017 or 2019. Unless further changes are made, these homes will therefore be subjected to a special planning zone (SPZ) decreed by the province, which essentially places a freeze on any potential new construction or renovation projects. There are also concerns regarding home insurance and the resale value of these properties if they remain in a designated special flood zone.
Beaconsfield’s Georges Bourelle and Dorval’s Edgar Rouleau didn’t mince words when speaking with the West Island Gazette. They both labelled the ongoing inaccuracies in the flood map as inept and incompetent work by provincial officials.
“They did some corrections, but it still doesn’t make any sense,” Rouleau said of including Dorval homes on the revised flood map. “We still have a lot houses in our territory that were never flooded before.
“I don’t think they have any idea what they are doing,” he added
The province ignored local civic officials and homeowners, who turned up en masse at a July 4 information meeting in Pointe-Claire and repeatedly pointed out that homes along Lac St-Louis were not flooded in spring 2017 or 2019, Rouleau said.
At least they removed the Dorval Gardens shopping centre, located just southwest of the Highway 20/Dorval Circle interchange, from the second edition of the SPZ released Monday, Rouleau noted.
Bourelle said his city made its position clear in a resolution tabled last week, which demanded all 197 Beaconsfield homes included in the initial SPZ be removed from any revised food zone map.
“They removed some of the properties, but there remain several properties that were not flooded and are still on the map. That’s extremely disappointing,” he said.
For instance, the mayor noted all of the homes in the Thompson Point neighbourhood are still erroneously included in the SPZ, considering none of them were flooded in 2017 and 2019.
“What’s the rationale being used here — know one knows,” Bourelle said of the flood map. “Frankly, I think there is a lot of incompetence right now in this process.”
In the provincial decree adopted for the SPZ, the city of Montreal is listed, but none of the reconstituted West Island municipalities, such as Beaconsfield, are named, although they are marked in the online flood zone, Bourelle pointed out.
Lac St-Louis is also governed by navigational rules, which control water flow from Lake Ontario to Montreal and prevents massive flooding, Bourelle said.
Beaconsfield and Dorval city councils will once again demand withdrawal of all homes in their respective territories from the SPZ.
Affected homeowners still have until Aug. 19 to request revisions.
The mayors suggested affected homeowners could consider launching a class-action lawsuit against the province if their properties remains on the SPZ despite not being flooded in 2017 and 2019.
Rouleau said he has lived near the lake in Dorval for many years and his home has never been flooded.
New building restrictions might be needed in areas hit hard by floods twice in the past three years. However, it’s clear to me that the province dropped the ball preparing its SPZ by needlessly creating stress for West Island homeowners who didn’t get touched at all by the recent spring floods.
