Building drains needs money... Expect more floods coming your way!
==
Jun 28, 2010
PM: Don't expect flood-free Singapore
Preventing widespread floods more realistic, he says
By Jeremy Au Yong, Political Correspondent
GIVEN Singapore's tropical climate, it will be very costly to keep the country flood-free, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong yesterday.
Speaking for the first time on the two flash floods this month, he noted that any attempt to wipe out flooding here would require plenty of money and land.
'If you are going to do that, you will need huge tracts of land put aside for huge monsoon drains, which will be empty most of the time, (and) the infrastructure will cost a lot of money and it is not worth it,' he said.
A more realistic objective, he added, is to prevent widespread and prolonged flooding, and limit the risk to lives and damage to property.
Mr Lee made the point while assuring Singaporeans that the Government 'will continue to implement new drainage works, to improve the design of the drainage systems and deal with more intense storms'.
'But I don't think it is possible in Singapore to expect the place to be completely free of floods,' he said, as heavy downpours are very much part of the climate for an 'island in the tropics'.
PM Lee was speaking at the opening of new facilities at Lower Seletar Reservoir that include a Rower's Bay for competitive rowing and a 170m bridge that gives panoramic views of the reservoir.
They were built under a programme known as ABC Waters (Active, Beautiful, Clean), to freshen up Singapore's reservoirs and rivers and turn them into recreation spaces.
The Prime Minister, in his speech, also stressed the need to have contingency plans for unusually heavy rain to ensure swift response in pinpointing the problem areas, dealing with them and 'putting them right'.
He was keen to make sure the recent floods that caused chaos and disruption in Orchard Road, Thomson Road, Bukit Timah and Tanjong Katong would not happen again.
'We have to learn from these episodes, do post-mortems, find out what happened, and upgrade our infrastructure and systems,' he said.
The flood that submerged parts of Orchard Road two weeks ago was the worst to hit the area in more than two decades.
It caused traffic chaos and millions in losses as several shops on the shopping belt were inundated with waist-high water.
The flood was blamed on a clogged drain in the area and record rainfall - 60 per cent of what normally falls in the entire month of June poured down in one morning.
A similar storm landed a week later, and this time it was areas such as Thomson Road, Bukit Timah and Tanjong Katong that saw rising waters which, however, subsided in 30 minutes.
The two incidents had many Singaporeans chiding national water agency, PUB .
Yesterday, PM Lee defended the agency's work, noting that floods were relatively rare occurrences in Singapore.
'PUB has ongoing drainage improvement programmes which, over the years, have made floods much rarer, and much less severe so much so that when it does happen, we are sometimes taken by surprise and we scramble to see how we can deal with those remaining problems,' he said.
PUB had admitted to being caught off-guard by the Orchard Road floods and has since taken several measures.
They include installing new gratings on drains upstream of Orchard Road to trap debris such as leaves and plastic bags and having its contractors clean big drains monthly instead of quarterly.
But ultimately, it is not just the PUB that has to take flood prevention measures, said Mr Lee.
'We all have parts to play, to keep our public places and our waterways clean.
'We must prevent litter from choking up our drains. Otherwise, the litter will find its ways into the canals, into the drains, into the reservoirs and pollute our water supply,' he said.
[email protected]
==
Jun 28, 2010
PM: Don't expect flood-free Singapore
Preventing widespread floods more realistic, he says
By Jeremy Au Yong, Political Correspondent
GIVEN Singapore's tropical climate, it will be very costly to keep the country flood-free, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong yesterday.
Speaking for the first time on the two flash floods this month, he noted that any attempt to wipe out flooding here would require plenty of money and land.
'If you are going to do that, you will need huge tracts of land put aside for huge monsoon drains, which will be empty most of the time, (and) the infrastructure will cost a lot of money and it is not worth it,' he said.
A more realistic objective, he added, is to prevent widespread and prolonged flooding, and limit the risk to lives and damage to property.
Mr Lee made the point while assuring Singaporeans that the Government 'will continue to implement new drainage works, to improve the design of the drainage systems and deal with more intense storms'.
'But I don't think it is possible in Singapore to expect the place to be completely free of floods,' he said, as heavy downpours are very much part of the climate for an 'island in the tropics'.
PM Lee was speaking at the opening of new facilities at Lower Seletar Reservoir that include a Rower's Bay for competitive rowing and a 170m bridge that gives panoramic views of the reservoir.
They were built under a programme known as ABC Waters (Active, Beautiful, Clean), to freshen up Singapore's reservoirs and rivers and turn them into recreation spaces.
The Prime Minister, in his speech, also stressed the need to have contingency plans for unusually heavy rain to ensure swift response in pinpointing the problem areas, dealing with them and 'putting them right'.
He was keen to make sure the recent floods that caused chaos and disruption in Orchard Road, Thomson Road, Bukit Timah and Tanjong Katong would not happen again.
'We have to learn from these episodes, do post-mortems, find out what happened, and upgrade our infrastructure and systems,' he said.
The flood that submerged parts of Orchard Road two weeks ago was the worst to hit the area in more than two decades.
It caused traffic chaos and millions in losses as several shops on the shopping belt were inundated with waist-high water.
The flood was blamed on a clogged drain in the area and record rainfall - 60 per cent of what normally falls in the entire month of June poured down in one morning.
A similar storm landed a week later, and this time it was areas such as Thomson Road, Bukit Timah and Tanjong Katong that saw rising waters which, however, subsided in 30 minutes.
The two incidents had many Singaporeans chiding national water agency, PUB .
Yesterday, PM Lee defended the agency's work, noting that floods were relatively rare occurrences in Singapore.
'PUB has ongoing drainage improvement programmes which, over the years, have made floods much rarer, and much less severe so much so that when it does happen, we are sometimes taken by surprise and we scramble to see how we can deal with those remaining problems,' he said.
PUB had admitted to being caught off-guard by the Orchard Road floods and has since taken several measures.
They include installing new gratings on drains upstream of Orchard Road to trap debris such as leaves and plastic bags and having its contractors clean big drains monthly instead of quarterly.
But ultimately, it is not just the PUB that has to take flood prevention measures, said Mr Lee.
'We all have parts to play, to keep our public places and our waterways clean.
'We must prevent litter from choking up our drains. Otherwise, the litter will find its ways into the canals, into the drains, into the reservoirs and pollute our water supply,' he said.
[email protected]
