Monday night’s Bridgeville council meeting brought several pieces of good news for residents concerned about flooding near Baldwin Street.
Just minutes before the meeting began, the borough received a permit to install a “trash rack” in McLaughlin Creek near the baseball field. The device would catches floating debris before it clogs up the narrower waterways closer to town.
In addition, the state Department of Environment Protection seems receptive to a proposed levee near the Dari-Delite on Commercial Street. The levee would help keep creek water moving during heavy rains.
Brett emphasized that no single improvement is a magic bullet to stop flooding, but the combination of trash rack, levee, a wall along Baldwin Street, two new bridges, and some other measures should let the next “100 year flood” pass through town without the destruction the community experienced two year ago.
“When you combine all of those things, you prevent the water from leaving the stream up above the park, down through the park, and then down the street,” he said.
“We can pass the 100-year storm event through the borough.”
The borough might award a contract for trash rack installation as soon as next month. That work would also include lowering the McLaughlin Park baseball field to give debris and excess water a place to go during heavy rain.
The proposed levee behind Dari-Delite would be 4-to-5-feet high and extend to the creek outlet near Collier. Brett hopes to meet with the Bridgeville Planning Commission this summer to discuss potential plans for levees.
Brett is also working on a presentation to council and the community to offer further detail on each component of these flood mitigation projects.
Former mayor Pat DeBlasio, praised the trash rack concept as both effective and a good value for the taxpayer dollar.
“I have been sold on the value of the trash rack since Bill Colussy first proposed it several years ago,” he said. “It’s economical and solves a significant source of debris that seems to cause the flooding.