Rain! The dirty water flows!

Jonny534 said :

epic thread is epic

Did I miss something? When did 20 posts become epic?

Feathergirl said :

All this rain is lovely. All the trees seem to be every shade and tint of green and the fog on the hills looks magic. Don’t you just love the smell of rain too?

Also fun is driving through those HUGE puddles and fanning up the water WHOOOOOOOSHHHHH!

Oh wonderful! nothing like a spot of the old aquaplaning to get the adrenaline pumping!

It got even worse after state of origin finished. Nutters everywhere and no acting super Neit out and about to tell us he is disappointed.

Feathergirl said :

All this rain is lovely. All the trees seem to be every shade and tint of green and the fog on the hills looks magic. Don’t you just love the smell of rain too?

The gum trees in the grass behind OPH smelled amazing today, wonderful smell. Peppermint, eucalyptus, and other smells you’d make a fortune from if you could bottle them. Got a bit wet but boy that’s 100% better than getting dusty. And you’re right, the colours just blast out in the rain and mist.

Canberra drivers became over-challenged though. At home-time, 7-odd of them had managed to smack each others’s bums on Kings Ave (heading up towards Russell Roundabout). And there were two separate events of cars mounting the concrete thing on the Dairy Flat Road bridge, heading towards Moreshed lights in the evening. As we headed out to Kingston a truck was picking two cars off the concrete barrier. When we returned a while later, the cops were running about and there was small 121-ish thing straddling the concrete!

Clown Killer said :

The retro-fitted wetland behind O’Connor shops is an example of how that form of water retention might work. Thanks to the work of TAMS and the Sullivans Creek Catchment Group there’s another one of those wetlands going to be retro-fitted on Banksia Street. that said I doubt that there’s an engineered solution that would avoid the need for the Sullivans Creek to perform a storm-water function so I guess the concrete is here to stay.

I watched Sullies lose a foot in depth due to siltation in less than a year, so not too sure that another flow reducer in that area would be such a good thing.
Our rivers need a good flushing from time to time, esp in spring to encourage spawning. Sadly the only things doing any significant spawning in Sullies or Jerra wetlands are carp. A ‘catchment group’ for Sullies is something I can only see as well meaning but misguided. It cannot make any meaningful or significant impact due to the design. Unless tennis balls and Macca’s wrappers are to be considered a visual amenity. Right Idea. Wrong place.

That aside, more wetlands sited correctly in general can only improve the health of our waterways.

I recently took a trip to the Tumut canal (it’s not a river any more) which has been rockwalled along much of its length to sustain irrigation flows. I did not encounter a water bird, insect or weed bed. I was totally disgusted at the destruction. A few back eddies out of the main flow would allow irrigation flows, and provide habitat for the various insects, birds, amphibians, plants and fish the rivers need to survive. Also have photos two weeks apart of the top (‘digbee) end of the ‘juck shallowing from a lake to a pond.

Remember that our urban lakes are designed primarily for visual appeal, and secondly for reducing pollutants from reaching the ‘bidgee. A minimum depth in all places is also a required designh element to prevent mosquitos etc.

I personally think the best thing that could be done is to back up the Molonglo near Coppins, slightly flooding to near the high flow mark thus creating a vast wetland area along the corridor. It would still be a carpitat area but natives would have a better go, and the amphibians down there would be better off as well. It would also handle the high flow events due to the valley like structure.

/Me applauds Environment ACT and their NSW counterparts for the work they have been doing recently (in places most will never see) on blackberry control as well.

I would like to see the health of the rivers given a higher priority environment wise in general.

And the sound of rain on the roof is one of life’s free pleasures.

epic thread is epic

Feathergirl @ #16. Agree, after all the wind and rain last weekend everything just seemed cleaner and clearer, like all the smog, not that we really have any down here, was washed away.

I think we need to remove all value words from weather reports. So instead of ‘fine’ it’s ‘sunny’ or ‘dry’.

Although from a personal perspective, locked up at home with sick kids is no fun. Rain. rain, go away!

I’m so old and have been in Canberra for so long, I remember rain when it was considered a nuisance!

All this rain is lovely. All the trees seem to be every shade and tint of green and the fog on the hills looks magic. Don’t you just love the smell of rain too?

Also fun is driving through those HUGE puddles and fanning up the water WHOOOOOOOSHHHHH!

rain and school students dont mix. keeping kids locked up all day is torture for all concerned!!!

feel free to rain on down between about 3:30pm-8:45am. Why does it always seem to piss down right at 3pm?!!

rosebud said :

We need something like that in the inner north. Hmmmm, I’m sure all those soccer mums and dads wouldn’t mind sharing some of the Dickson playing field with a few herons annd frogs.

LOL. At our club the Under7’s are the Herrons and the Under 8’s the Frogs.

We need something like that in the inner north. Hmmmm, I’m sure all those soccer mums and dads wouldn’t mind sharing some of the Dickson playing field with a few herons annd frogs.

johnboy said :

Because we like the water moved swiftly away so as to prevent flooding?

No actually JB. With flooding it is the velocity of water that causes damage. Wet is wet, but mowed down is another thing altogether. Pondage is more important, and that’s the problem with so much filling going on. And narrow deep concrete channels remove a lot of that pondage too.

Constructed wetlands function as ‘detention basins’ holding up the first flush, but through ‘trickle pipes’ allowing a lot of the water to get away more sedately. These outlets are set at a lower level than the spillway so hopefully there is excess capacity in the dam when a storm event comes along – a full to the brim dam isn’t much help at all with flood mitigation.

And what clown killer said – spot on. For two years I have been pitching a similar solution for a site in Gungahlin opposite Burgmann School, and it finally looks like happening. There’s a meeting at the school about it next Tuesday night – details on our website.

The retro-fitted wetland behind O’Connor shops is an example of how that form of water retention might work. Thanks to the work of TAMS and the Sullivans Creek Catchment Group there’s another one of those wetlands going to be retro-fitted on Banksia Street. that said I doubt that there’s an engineered solution that would avoid the need for the Sullivans Creek to perform a storm-water function so I guess the concrete is here to stay.

Designing your house, garden and water management system is a great way to take the pressure off the storm water system. Choosing water permiable rather than hard paving surfaces, installing rainwater tanks and planting native species all helps.

There’s an artificial wetland in Evatt up near the soccer club. it works really well not only as habitat but also as a filter for the water.

is that what that is? i always thought it was a dumping ground for bogan cr@p.

Constructed wetlands are the new black!

http://www.education.melbournewater.com.au/content/rivers_and_drainage/wetlands_-_natures_filter/wetlands_-_natures_filter.asp

dark lady wolf mother said

DarkLadyWolfMother said :

I don’t think I’ve ever understood why “rain stopping” means the weather is improving. Especially in a drought.

What she said! Fair dinkum, people will grumble about the rain, and then move on to a complain about water restrictions!

And whenever a shower of rain encourages one to think the drought is over, just go to some ground and dig a little hole. The dry hard soil in there will reveal the true situation. You won’t need more than a little hole.

rosebud said :

All that water rushing away from where it is needed. Why don’t they tear up those concrete river banks and create some wet land areas to store the water and give the birdies a home?

johnboy said :

Because we like the water moved swiftly away so as to prevent flooding?

Not impossible to do both. I think TAMS intends to do something like this as part of the

Canberra Integrated Urban Waterways Project

rosebud said :

All that water rushing away from where it is needed. Why don’t they tear up those concrete river banks and create some wet land areas to store the water and give the birdies a home?

Do you like sandbagging your home?

Because we like the water moved swiftly away so as to prevent flooding?

All that water rushing away from where it is needed. Why don’t they tear up those concrete river banks and create some wet land areas to store the water and give the birdies a home?

hopefully it rains on the weekend. fireworks don’t like rain…

I don’t think I’ve ever understood why “rain stopping” means the weather is improving. Especially in a drought.