Australian politician dismisses need for Swan River flood barrier

The West (Australia): Installing a flood barrier in the Swan River, similar to the system of gates in London’s Thames Barrier was an absurd idea, Premier Colin Barnett said today. Shadow climate change minister Alannah MacTiernan yesterday urged the State Government to begin planning a huge multi million-dollar project to protect Perth homes and infrastructure from record tides and rising sea levels.

The minister’s idea was backed by University of WA environmental researcher and oceanographer Chari Pattiaratchi who said Perth will be hit with a “double whammy” in about 20 years when the tidal cycle would bring higher and more frequent storm surges on top of rising sea levels. But the Premier dismissed the idea of a system if gates in the Swan River, saying Perth’s environment was totally different to London. “I don’t think that is at all warranted,” he said.

…Professor Pattiaratchi, a member of the panel of expert scientists which advises the Swan River Trust, said the tidal cycle was at a peak that would decrease in about a decade before peaking again in about 20 years. “In about another 20 years we will be in a situation where we will actually be flooding all the time,” Professor Pattiaratchi said.

…. “The consequences of not acting would be a whole lot of infrastructure that would be regularly at risk, including the freeway, places like the convention centre, really any development on the foreshore.”….

Fremantle and the Swan River viewed from the air, looking east towards Perth CBD. Photograph taken by Kristian Maley, 4 June 2005. Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2