Yarra Ranges Council has confirmed the municipality has experienced wetter than normal conditions for the past two years, causing further issues for property owners and council assets.
Stormwater runoff has been being pushed into Upwey resident Cindy Taylor’s front yard, and flooding underneath her house.
Ms Taylor said the large amount of rain recently has washed the gravel from underneath the road onto her property and lifted the road by around two inches.
“We’ve just done huge amounts of landscaping out the back, we’ve got $2,000 worth of topsoil that’s getting washed away,” Ms Taylor said.
“It’s just annoying. Very annoying.”
Alongside damage to landscaping, Cindy said mold has started appearing on a windowsill in the house, causing the house to smell “constantly”.
“There should not be mold on a window. So I’m worried about that, but I’m also worried about the water – what damage that is doing to under the house,” Ms Taylor said.
“Even though we’ve got concrete stumps, we’ve still got an awful lot of timber in the house; what it’s doing the constant moisture to the timber under the house, the fact that we’ve just done huge amounts of landscaping, and whether that’s all going to be compromised.
One of our retaining walls out the front – that’s all got black mold all over the front of it now. We had to actually replace a retaining wall along the side of the house…which was only sort of six or seven years old, which is not right either.”
In a statement to the Star Mail, Yarra Ranges Council’s Director of Environment and Infrastructure Bill Millard said an initial inspection of the council road on which Ms Taylor lives in October 2021, found that the council’s drains were “unobstructed,” and the road had not been affected at that time.
According to Mr Millar, this was seconded in another inspection in early 2022.
“Recently, Council received another request in August to investigate the issue of water runoff and drainage at this location on Acacia Avenue,” he said.
“Since receiving this request, Council Officers have met with the residents and inspected the location to assess the impact from the recent, high rainfall in the area and contractors have already been engaged to use CCTV cameras to investigate whether the stormwater pipes under the road have been affected.
Following the CCTV footage feedback, Council will work with the residents to investigate the issue of water run-off and drainage at this site.”
Ms Taylor said the water runs down the drain along the opposite side of the road to a certain degree, but the road then kicks the water straight over to her property.
She said the rainfall expected in coming days, and the lack of council action since last October, has created the “perfect storm.”
“It’s just an absolute nightmare,” she said.
In a Facebook post published on Friday 7 October, Yarra Ranges Council said wet weather is also contributing to more potholes in the area, encouraging residents to report potholes they come across.
“Our crews are buckling down to resolve an extra 20 [per cent] increase in road maintenance requests,” the Facebook post read.
“So if you see a pothole – please report it. We investigate every report made for the roads we manage and if repairs are required we will:
Repair within 20 days on sealed roads
Repair within 10 days on unsealed roads”
To report a pothole online, visit yarraranges.vic.gov.au/pothole or call 1300 368 333.
For potholes on roads managed by VicRoads, report to VicRoads at https://www.vicroads.vic.gov.au/traff…/report-a-road-issue
