Kilcreggan residents are clearing up and counting the cost of Saturday’s floods, which saw serious flooding in at least two houses.
Volunteers have been clearing debris from the shore ranging from wooden panels to chairs, while a section of School Road was badly damaged after being lifted by flood water for the third time in less than a year.
One household was evacuated from Tigh Dearg Road on Saturday, while a house in School Road was severely flooded.
Ironically, the storm came as long-awaited work by Argyll and Bute Council to cure flooding problems in Tigh Dearg was due to start, with contractors’ machinery in place at the bottom of the road, while an emergency planning event had to be cancelled because of the weather.
At last night’s meeting of Cove and Kilcreggan Community Council, convener John Auld said: “There has been one or two spectacular days in Argyll and Bute – we have experienced events before and we will experience events again.
” I am grateful that work has started at Tigh Dearg but it has taken 30 years – if we were to start on School Road it would take ten years.”
He told Tigh Dearg residents at the meeting: “It is not a simple fix and the contract should have been awarded in April.
“We want to express our sympathy with you.”
One Tigh Dearg resident said she had been completely flooded out of her home, and several complained that they had not been given details of the work, which was due to start last week.
And another said: “When are all the residents of Tigh Dearg Road going to be notified of the scheme of work?
“The only timescale that I am aware of is that there is going to be work going on until the 31st of January.
“I have now been told that is only part of the work and it is going to be going on later than that.
“This road is a disaster, and not just on the flooding front – it is no through road but cars and lorries are coming up there and getting stuck, wrecking walls.”
Argyll and Bute councillor Mark Irvine said he had been told that there had been a meeting on site with residents but found out on Friday that it had not been held, and he had asked why a consultation had not taken place.
Community council secretary Sheelagh O’Reilly said that an emergency planning event which had been scheduled for Saturday morning had to be cancelled because of the weather, but would now be rescheduled, probably for October 21 in Kilcreggan bus shelter and the following Saturday in Cove.
“It showed that we are subject to crises!” she said, adding that the initiation phase of the emergency planning project would be taken forward and might include pursuing grants for floodgates.”
The community council will write to Argyll and Bute about the School Road problem, and Cllr Irvine said he would be in touch with officials to draw up a plan to solve the problem of repeated flooding.
Argyll and Bute Council has not responded to requests for comment on the Tigh Dearg work.
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