Resilience NSW attacked over Mullumbimby pod village earthworks
Resilience NSW’s ‘misguided’ decision to raise a section of land at Mullumbimby in the state’s north in a bid to establish a pod village has sparked a furore. Read why the neighbours are fearful of what happens when you try and control nature.
Byron Shire
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Resilience NSW’s “misguided” decision to raise a section of land at Mullumbimby in the state’s north in a bid to establish a pod village for residents who lost their homes to flood has sparked a furore.
The irony is that the land on Prince St also flooded earlier this year, prompting the move by the state government agency to build up the area by dumping earth at the site.
The question now is how those earthworks might affect water flows in a future event.
Residents near the Prince St pod village site received notification of the intended works little more than a day before construction began on July 11.
The work included importing fill onto the flood-plain and building it to heights of between 0.8m and 1.5m above the pre-existing ground level.
Byron Shire councillor and flood hydrologist, Duncan Dey, said Resilience NSW’s decision was “misguided”.
Mr Dey said the amount of fill brought to the site was “an atrocity” - and it could lead to significant water level rises in the area during a future flood.
“It’s a stupid anomaly that we are creating this housing in the middle of a flood-plain to house people who have been flooded,” he said.
“Nobody is looking at the people that are still stuck in their houses, half of which are sitting there with the walls stripped out and the owner still (living) there.”
Mr Dey said the development has also been shockingly slow for a project that is supposed to be providing emergency accommodation.
“The fill was put in a few months ago and they are still slowly putting the pods on like a deck of cards, it’s quite stunning,” he said.
The neighbours surrounding the site, along with the wider Mullumbimby community, are aghast.
“By not consulting the neighbours they (Resilience NSW) have made a huge mistake and sadly since then they’ve spent their energy trying to cover it up,” Mr Dey said.
Local residents query why a Resilience NSW investigation into the matter has not yet been released to the public.
Byron mayor Michael Lygon said he would share the report with the public as soon as possible.
Mr Dey said the mayor should be “demanding the report from Resilience NSW and that they make it public”.
“People want to know if their flood levels have been made worse by this fill and by how much,” Mr Dey said.
“If we were to get another flood, then that fill is likely to have made their flood levels higher than they would be if that fill wasn’t there.”
As a hydrologist, Mr Dey said the general rule is, “if you put a blockage on a flood-plain and stop the water from flowing where it wants to, you’ll increase the flood levels”.
Mr Dey - who will raise the matter at Byron council’s meeting on October 27, advises two courses of action.
“One of them is to get in there and look after those people who are still sitting in their flooded houses in that part of Mullumbimby and see what they need,” he said.
“And secondly, to make a promise that fill will be removed at the end of the two-year period (of the pod village’s expected life).”
He said he will use today’s council meeting at Mullumbimby to turn up the heat.
“I will ask that Resilience NSW make that report public and let people know what’s going on,” he said.
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