james_davis_nicoll | News from Calgary

We're two years after the Christchurch earthquakes here, and still very much at the start of rebuilding in terms of the central city area. Flooding is a different sort of damage that presents different challenges, of course, and I wish the Calgary people luck in getting their lives sorted. But after the NZ experiences, the time frames mentioned for the restoration of services etc haven't exactly been surprising.

Considering that the coverage I've seen on CBC looks rather like the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, I'm not in the least shocked. AAMOF, I think she's being optimistic.

Rate things have been going, they'll have had another robust flood by then.

Which might help with washing away the debris.

(I know, sadly things don't work out that way).

Ten years seems an awful long time though perhaps she is considering all the effects of the flooding. Homes that have been flooded may or may not be habitable again with a large number being in the not habitable range. Even those that merely have had their basements flooded will likely have serious issues with mold.

I cannot believe it is merely a matter of cost. Alberta is the wealthiest province in the country and the revenue generated by the clean up and what ever upgrades are deemed necessary should add a far bit back into the provincial coffers. I also expect Harper to toss a lot of money at the clean up because Alberta. He can't afford to alienate his political base.

Well, just one of the problems:

The Saddledome might be a write-off. No stadium, no NHL team, no Stampede acts, big splashy problem. But, as an economic repair priority, the limited supply of structural engineers should be surveying bridges, not fixing a stadium.

Multiply by lots. (There are major wrangles over "who pays"? still going on over lastingly damp basements from much less severe flooding in North York from 2005. Getting it all sorted out in ten years in Alberta, especially with the insurance industry doing its best to get people to move the whole town, would be miraculous.)

Then there's the problem of _how_. River beds move, the old stable slope is in Saskatchewan as a fine layer of sediment, just where _can_ we put this road? That's probably what's going on between Banff and Canmore, and in mountains, you can spend a ridiculous amount of money trying to create a stable slope if otherwise you haven't got one.

The CP line in the Crowsnest is out a bridge, bridge _gone_, not unsafe, bridge swept downstream so there's rail hanging over nothing. Can't even survey the bridge piers until the water goes down. And, obviously, the design failed; can't put it back, have to start the design process over. Only CP can't afford to do that _and_ fix Banff-Canmore, never mind all the other washouts. Getting rid of the Wheat Board and insisting on market solutions and market prices was a major Harper initiative; can they devote major money to fixing the CP lines before wheat has to be shipped to Vancouver?

I think ten years is wildly optimistic, myself.

I'd also really hate to be forced to bet there won't be another such flood before 2030.

I agree with much of what you are saying but I also think that huge amounts of money will be thrown at some aspects of the problem.Both the Stampede and Saddledome are cultural icons for the community and a very big part of how Calgarians see themselves.

I think the priorities will be getting the downtown functioning because the oil patch lives there and that is Alberta's and Canada's (at least under Harper) financial heartland.

I expect as much grain will be diverted through CN lines as possible. I am not certain of the viability of rebuilding the Crownest route for CP. I suspect, but do not know, most of the traffic on that route was coal, from the Fernie area, heading to the Robert's Bank Terminal. If the washed out bridge is east of there then it may not have the same importance as the line through Canmore (again, I have been retired too long to have a solid idea of what is moving on the various routes).

Harper's ideological insistence on the dismantling of the CWB was not based on economic realities but it was important to the major railways (which had spent a lot of money supporting anti-CWB lobby groups) and various privately owned grain companies. It also earned him brownie points with the US government which had been trying to get the CWB shut down for many years.

Sure, cultural icons, grounds for public support to spend a ton of money; doesn't mean that there's actually _time_ to do everything necessary, even with the arbitrary resources they don't have, not for this year.

I figure they will divert as much as they can through CN, sure, but I'm equally sure they're not running the CN lines under 50% capacity at present.

The Wheat Board was totally an ideological decision. I'm expecting an equally ideological decision to insist that the private sector handle the majority of the recovery.

I'm expecting an equally ideological decision to insist that the private sector handle the majority of the recovery.

The private sector will handle the recovery, with public money and minimal oversight because by definition it is the most efficient and best way of doing things.

It'll be like the G20 spending, but more so…

I don't think they will get it all done in a year either but I think somethings will get support and I do expect to see the Saddledome and the Stampede up and running in time for summer of 2014.

I may be wrong but I don't think ideology will prevent the Federal Conservatives from throwing a tonne of resources into cleaning up the mess. After thinking about it for a bit, I would actually be a bit upset if they don't do what they can to clean up the mess. Coming from a province that has had a lot of issues with flooding (Manitoba), I shouldn't complain when some one else gets help. Sure some of the problems are due to building on flood plains but the people who homes were destroyed probably had no idea of the risk. Now if they rebuild on the same location without making some serious and viable plans to prevent the problem from re-occurring then I think it should be tough luck.

So...getting rid of CWB = railroads shooting themselves just below the hip joint?

Oh no. The railways were upset with the CWB because it would interfere with their ability to maximize profits at the expense of the grain producers. Similar issue with privately owned grain companies though in the case of the railways, the CWB successfully sued them over performance. There were other issues as well.

We've got high river levels here in Saskatoon as well, supposedly the highest in 100 years. The Water Safety Authority let water out of the Gardiner Dam, claiming the water levels from Alberta might damage the dam if they didn't. Some farm land and sections of couple of low lying streets have been flooded, but there's been no real property damage. I was down to take a look yesterday at a boat launch near the Bessborough Hotel, and the water was high enough that most of that launch ramp was underwater. The increase in water speed was also obvious.

The northern Saskatchewan community of Cumberland House and the Cumberland House First Nation have been evatuated due to flooding concerncs. All this on top of problems we had this year due to a very wet Spring, like sections of highways being damaged.

Edited 2013-06-25 14:42 (UTC)

Communities downstream have time to plan which can make all the difference in the world. In 1997, Grand Forks, N.D. was inundated because they hadn't any idea of how bad the flooding would be. Winnipeg, being many days downstream, had the opportunity to properly prepare and so it was saved from the floods*.

* The Red River Floodway helped but many homes would still have been lost without a lot of sandbagging and dike building.

Any word on the state of the communities along the shores of Diefenbaker Lake?

For such a severe event that covers so much of an area ten years to clean and recover is not an unrealistic estimate.

After Hurricane Camille in 1969 it took more than ten years.

The problem is that the climate has changed and is continuing to change. The old models no longer are in effect, so the likelihood is that another huge event of this nature will take place within that ten years -- and perhaps more than merely 'another.'

Love, C.

One thought. Look at New Orleans. Yes, the politics are wildly different, but the damage looked about the same on TV, and they're still cleaning up down there. I think ten years is wildly optimistic, too, but I would not be in the least surprised if the Saddledome and the Stampede facilities were expedited the way the Superdome was, either.

And Deepwater Horizon hasn't made things any easier for New Orleans than it has for anywhere else along the Gulf Coast, one suspects.

Calgary is in the process of losing a rail bridge, one which passed its post-flood inspection.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/06/27/train_derails_on_calgary_bridge_over_swollen_bow_river.html

That's not an argument for an expectation of a quick cleanup.

A bridge laden with fuel-filled railway cars, IIRC.

Edited 2013-06-27 17:12 (UTC)

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