Up and down Robinson Road, tenants waited outdoors Monday for floodwaters to drain from their basement apartments. A torrential downpour of 2 inches of rain fell Sunday afternoon, swamping parking lots and making several streets impassable.
On Monday, David Jemes said his toilet “exploded” with floodwaters in his basement apartment at 6367 Robinson Road, and more than an inch remained pooled on his floors. While the parking lot behind the apartment building still had significant flooding, the parking lot next door was dry.
Moisture in the top meter of soil in the Lockport area had already reached the 90th percentile before the weekend, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s website drought.gov. The site lists this year as the wettest in 132 years, with 12 1/2 inches more precipitation than normal. It listed last month as the fifth wettest August, with 2.6 inches more rain than typical.
Bill Wasinger stood on a sidewalk along Robinson Road Monday morning, where a large orange pump from the Town of Lockport had drawn water out of the sanitary sewer the previous night. Wasinger said his basement apartment at 6383 Robinson had flooded for the second time since August, and he wanted to know why the ditches weren’t draining it away.
“Yesterday was way beyond what we could predict,” said Mark Crocker, Town of Lockport supervisor. “I can confidently say we are doing everything we can to help those people on Robinson Road. We’re trying to make sure the ditches are clean.”
Crocker said the town’s orange pump was used to reduce the pressure on the apartment buildings’ sewers to prevent bathroom backups.
Crocker said an apartment tenant had visited his office Monday morning and described the flooding at a Robinson Road building.
“He said when it rains really hard, the apartment owner turns off the water so they can’t flush, I guess to try to prevent backflow,” Crocker said. “I believe most of the basement apartments from Hillman’s Auto east on Robinson had all their basements flooded. The water was surrounding all the complexes and crossed Robinson Road.”
Crocker said he joined highway crews Sunday evening checking drainage around the town. He said the state Department of Transportation (DOT) was also making sure Robinson Road was draining. Crocker said they did not find any blockages. Crocker said the DOT must be involved in the area’s flooding response because Robinson and Dysinger roads are state roads and the state maintains the ditches.
“Congressmen Tenney and Langworth have been in contact with the town and we are going to jointly host a meeting with the New York State DOT (Department of Transportation), New York DEC (Department of Environmental Conservation), and we’re going to see if we can increase the volume of water that’s being processed through Mud Creek and Donner Creek,” Crocker said Monday. “Mud Creek was the creek that was handling the water that was flowing from Robinson south. It winds through The Villages and past Rapids. The DEC controls part of Mud Creek that we would like to get in and clean to flow better, but we need DEC approval. As recently as last year, when the water was running slowly south of town, we found beaver dams. We got DEC approval to remove them.”
Crocker said he recognizes how disruptive the flooding is for the apartment tenants.
“It’s heartbreaking to see those nine apartment complexes flood on Robinson Road, but they were built too low 50 or 60 years ago,” Crocker said. “For some reason we’re getting hit with more storms than ever before. We requested that those apartments put in backflow preventers to prevent sewage from backing up into lower apartments. When you have these big storms with saturated ground, you’ve got big problems on your hands. We’re doing everything we can. I think we will set up an official meeting when (the congressmen) come to the Town of Lockport. Hopefully we can make it better.”