Work is beginning on a new multi-million dollar project in Tecumseh to better manage flood risks triggered by climate change.
Windsor-Tecumseh Liberal MP Irek Kusmierczyk and Tecumseh mayor Gary McNamara took part in a ground breaking ceremony Tuesday for the Scully-St. Mark's Pump Station and Riverside Drive East reconstruction project.
The work involves the construction of a new, consolidated Scully-St. Mark's Storm Pump Station; construction of a new Riverside Drive Trunk Storm Sewer to move stormwater runoff to the consolidated Scully and St. Mark's pump station and the decommissioning of the existing Scully and St. Mark's Storm Pump Stations.
In 2016, 220 mm of rain fell in the town of Tecumseh within a 12 hour period. The massive storm resulted in more than 1,600 homes being flooded and led to a state of emergency being declared.
A report looking at the impact of the storm found Tecumseh's storm sewer system functioned properly, but was overwhelmed by the amount of rain in such a short time period, which resulted in more than 600-million gallons of water flowing through the town's pumps.
McNamara says this project will provide eight to ten times more capacity than the existing pumps.
"What we're trying to build here is resiliency and to deal with those large rain events, they're going to happen," he says. "To say 2016 was an anomaly, it really isn't. If we look at the intensity of the rains we've had since 2016, we've hit those 25 year, 50 year, 75 year type storms."
Tecumseh mayor Gary McNamara and Windsor-Tecumseh Liberal MP Irek Kusmierczyk speak during a news conference at Lakewood Park in Tecumseh. Aug. 1, 2023 (Photo: Rusty Thomson)
The federal government is providing $10.7 million in this flood resiliency project through the Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Fund (DMAF), while the Town of Tecumseh is spending $16.3-million on the project.
McNamara points out that a lot of the existing pumping stations are over 60 years of age and were not designed for 100 year storms.
"Look at a car, look at an automobile, you can have the most beautiful shell out there, but if you haven't got an engine, you aren't going anywhere. Look at the pumping station as an engine, that's required to make sure that the shell that we have now stays beautiful," he adds.
A timeline for work on the Riverside Drive East reconstruction project is still being established.
The entire project is expected to be completed by 2027.