City says no solid plan yet to fix Albert Street underpass in wake of flooding

It may seem strange to see the Albert Street underpass flooded and vehicles stuck in the water Friday, but this is far from the first time it’s happened.

In fact, at least five vehicles were stuck under both the Albert Street and Broad Street underpasses during one storm in 2019.

Back then, the city promised to begin work on Albert Street by either 2021 or 2022.

In a news conference Friday, Helene Henning Hill — Regina’s sewer and drainage operations manager — wasn’t able to provide many details on when that work may start or what it might look like.

“You can appreciate that we (have) a lot of infrastructure in and around Saskatchewan Drive and Albert (Street). In order to try and determine the best engineered solution to how we deal with the water at that point, it takes time for us to look at that,” she said.

As of right now, it seems the city is still in the idea phase for how it’ll improve the underpass.

“That process has already started,” she said. “We’re trying to figure out what is the best recourse to deal with the water at the underpasses.”

The city’s storm response

Crews were busy Friday trying to address the widespread flooding.

According to Kim Onrait, the city’s citizen services executive director, somewhere between 50 millimetres and 60 millimetres (or about two to 2.4 inches) of rain fell from Thursday night to early Friday afternoon.

Henning Hill explained the city had to pull crews from other departments to help deal with the flooding.

“We talk to staff about, ‘Hey, heads up, there’s going to be a significant rain event. All hands on deck, so if it’s your day off, I want you to come in because we need the extra manpower.’ Then, we also borrow manpower from those who would not normally be able to work, like the parks people,” she explained.

It wasn’t just roadways that were swamped by the heavy, persistent rain.

In some cases, water came up onto people’s front lawns, threatening to flood the basement.

Little help? @CityofRegina pic.twitter.com/4Rm8UvhgOW

— Simon Enoch (@simon_enoch) June 11, 2021

Much better! Thank you @CityofRegina and Councillor @astevensward3 as well as a crack squad of neighbours pic.twitter.com/xBfT4ssccg

— Simon Enoch (@simon_enoch) June 11, 2021

Those extra city workers were in high demand. As of about 1 p.m. Friday, the city had 60 different service requests from people wanting help to deal with flooding. At that time, people had to wait at least an hour.

“That said, if somebody calls in and they’re very desperate for some help, we may send somebody out to evaluate what we can be doing in the interim,” Henning Hill continued.

While it depends on whether there is more rain in the evening, Henning Hill said things should be back to normal in the Queen City by Saturday.

A new use for the underpass

Apparently the Albert Street underpass was good for something Friday.

A small group of teenage boys turned the barricaded area into a waterpark, going tubing in the impromptu pool Friday afternoon.

(Joseph Ho/980 CJME)

“Everything’s closed with COVID and stuff. Got to find ways to entertain ourselves,” said Ethan Merk.

Drivers passing by could be seen mouthing disbelief at what they were seeing. Others simply honked as they kept going.

Merk seemed to enjoy the attention, the “pictures people were taking of us and waving and smiling and seeing people think it was funny and think it was good times.”

The teenagers said they had never seen flooding like this before. Neither had they attempted such a stunt.

Dylan Sakundiak summed up the experience succinctly: “Wet, cold, a little dirty.”