Riverbank collapse causing problems

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/05/2018 (2909 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Residents of an Elmwood-area seniors home were dismayed to discover a large fissure in the riverbank outside their home a couple weeks ago.

“The ground is dropping, the sidewalks now are sliding,” said Germaine Labossiere, who has lived at Columbus Centennial for 15 years.

Columbus Centennial House, a non-profit seniors housing cooperative located at 404 Desalaberry Ave., backs onto the Red River. For almost a decade, residents have watched as the river slowly eats away at the bank.

Sylvia Symchyshyn, president of the Columbus Centennial Co-op’s board of directors, said they’ve noticed considerable erosion taking place on the riverbank since 2011. The recent fissure is approximately 15 feet from the back of one of the main building.

“In the winter, part of riverbank collapsed,” Symchyshyn said. “It’s to the point now where we have fears that it is eroding so quickly that it will impact the ground between sidewalk and building.”

According to Symchyshyn, the building is on piles, so it should be secure from structural.

“Though it may become an island,” she added.

However, the damage to the bank is limiting what residents can do on the property.

“We’re all over 55 or more here, we can’t go on the sidewalk now with walkers or pushcarts,” Labossiere said. “It’s dangerous. And it’s sad for us people here, most of whom are over 80.”

The co-op owns the building, but it leases the land from the City of Winnipeg. Currently, the Columbus Centennial Co-op board is drafting a letter to mayor Brian Bowman, in hopes of impressing upon him the need for action.

“We’re at an impasse,” Symchyshyn said. “We’ve gone as far as we can go, we need political will.”

In the past two weeks, both Coun. Jason Schreyer (Elmwood-East Kildonan) and Jim Maloway, MLA for Elmwood visited the site and added their voices to the call for the government to step in.

“The most recent damage shows how severe the riverbank erosion is, and how quickly it may affect the building itself,” said Schreyer. “It’s obvious we need to address this immediately.”

There are over 200 riverbank sites on the Red and Assiniboine rivers owned or administered by the City, including parks, right-of-ways, City-owned golf courses, and other City-owned lands.

“There are approximately 40 different parameters that are used to determine a relative measure of risk at that location,” explained a City of Winnipeg spokesperson in an email. “This measure of risk is then used to assist in prioritizing sites for remedial works.”

And, while the City’s Riverbank Stabilization-Physical Asset Protection Fund has money allocated to protect the City’s riverbank assets, currently the land behind 404 Desalaberry is not being considered.

“There is no council-approved budget or program to support stabilization works on private lands or for the benefit of a private entity,” the City spokesperson explained. “(Though) a lease holder would be permitted to undertake remedial work along the riverbank. There are viable options available for individuals to preserve the land along a riverbank, to ensure the long-term protection of the building and accommodate other landscaping improvements.”

“The City has to take the lead on this important local issue,” Maloway stated. “(But) there is precedent for provincial assistance when damage like this occurs.”

But a spokesperson for the provincial department of municipal relations noted that “riverbank stabilization is the responsibility of the property owner. The province has no role in this particular matter.”

“We’ve met with senior city administration officials, who seem to imply that it’s our problem,” Symchyshyn confirmed. “But we don’t own the land, why would we fix land we don’t own? We’re not asking them to rebuild the 30 feet of missing riverbank, we’d just like some kind of retaining system so that it doesn’t slide any further.”

In the meantime, there’s not much Labossiere and other Columbus House residents can do.

“I’m not an engineer,” Labossiere said. “I don’t think our building will fall over, I hope it doesn’t tip over anyway. But I don’t want to move from here. It’s a beautiful place.”