Flooding should unite us
Re Indigenous leaders urge community relocation, April 30
I agree that Indigenous communities in Canada are struggling with flooding — a problem their spokesperson says “would have already been solved if it involved a non-Indigenous population.”
But flooding is occurring in many locations across Canada and I don’t believe it matters who you are. The problem is associated with climate change, which almost everyone in Canada and around the world has chosen to ignore.
We are one country with one people, united and equal. For any group to suggest there is favouritism is unfair and an insult to the people of this great country who have stood shoulder to shoulder in support. It is time we all realize no one group will move ahead of another if we don’t support and help each other.
Money doesn’t solve problems, people do — working together to make our lives better and take pride in what we accomplish.
Every generation and every nationality in Canada has made a great contribution to this country. It is time we recognize we are all equal and we all pay our way, one way or the other. No one deserves more than the next. Bev Northeast, Goodwood
Re Trudeau learns firsthand the PR perils of pitching in, May 1
No one ever wants their home or property flooded and the Justin Trudeau sandbag incident with the temporary grouch proves that emotions can run high in such situations.
In our lives, we each need to be so lucky that others are willing to help in times of trouble. This event is best left to rest and let us hope that man got to accomplish what he wanted, with good results for his neighbours. His heart was in the right place.
Trudeau was setting a fine example during his busy day, so no need to be critical of him for that. Natural disasters like this should be when Canadians all join hands and work shoulder-toshoulder — and I think we all know that. Norm Ferguson, Richmond Hill We should not be surprised that destructive flooding is an ongoing topic in our media. Weather patterns have been changing for decades and we have not taken proactive steps to change our stormwater management strategies to address the increasing precipitation.
Not only are we not proactive in our efforts, we are still at the testing stage of low-impact development and green infrastructure alternatives, even though they have been widely used in similar climates throughout Europe and beyond for decades.
It is imperative that we combine our efforts and start encouraging, promoting and supporting the use of green technologies, such as permeable pavements, green roofs and rain gardens. Change needs to start from the top and we are now looking to our municipalities to lead the way.
Let this be the year when we start to limit the sealed surfaces found throughout our cities and go green. Ellise Gasner, LID Permeable Paving, Toronto Re Islands brace for potential floods, May 2 A year ago, I wrote the Star and wondered if the city had done anything to mitigate future flooding on the island. Last year, we had very high water in the harbour but not flooding to the degree experienced in 2017. There were several reasons for that.
In 2017, several factors came into play that caused the severe flooding that affected Wards Island residents and Centre Island operations. These factors can be measured and flooding could be more readily predicted if the people responsible for waterfront management understood the complexity of the Great Lakes water basin.
The Mississippi water basin has a direct impact, since when that basin is experiencing flood levels, all dams on the Great Lakes feeding into the Mississippi basin are shut, as they were in 2017 but not last year. They are shut again this year, as the basin is experiencing flood levels.
The speed of the spring thaw is another major factor. The thaw in 2018 was very slow. We also experienced less snow in 2018 around the Great Lakes basin than either 2017 or this year.
Record rainfall in the mid-western U.S. and what we are seeing in all the major rivers in northern Ontario further compound the flooding.
The St. Lawrence River’s capacity to handle drainage is predicated on its direct feeder rivers and streams, and this is a record year for those feeder sources. Cornwall is the bottleneck for Lake Ontario and the dams there can only funnel so much water into the St. Lawrence before creating damaging flows that affect shipping into and out of the Great Lakes.
The Toronto islands are in a precarious situation because they are sandspits — their foundation is simply sand. When flooding occurs, this sand cannot hold back the pressure from the surrounding water. This artesian effect is simple science, almost a reverse osmosis.
You could put all the pumps in the world on Wards Island, but unless steel sheet piling 10 metres deep was hammered around the entire island, no level of pumping will mitigate flooding.
There is a very real possibility that this year’s flood levels will exceed 2017, as typical high water in Lake Ontario is late May to early June, and there is still snow in the bush in the Canadian Shield and ice along the shoreline of the Upper Kawarthas and Muskoka watershed. Rainfall is also expected to be above normal, according to forecasts.
One possible solution I would propose is that instead of building pipelines carrying oil from the West, we build pipelines carrying much-needed water to the West.
This would be the most productive infrastructure project our joint governments could accomplish since the completion of the seaway. Brian Smith, Toronto Send email to lettertoed@thestar.ca; via
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