Erin Insight: Minor flooding as deluge hits Erin

A combination of melting snow and persistent rain has damaged rural roads and caused minor flooding of low-lying properties in Erin village and Hillsburgh.

The Erin millpond overflowed its banks near the Charles Street dam on Tuesday, Feb. 20. Water was flowing on both sides of a house next to the dam before cascading back into the West Credit River, but there did not appear to be erosion or damage to the dam structure.

“It was pretty scary as the water kept coming up and up,” said Tim Inkster of Porcupine’s Quill on Main Street, who has a printing press in his basement close to the pond.

This is the highest water he has seen here in 45 years. It did not reach his basement, and was receding the next day. But with heavy ice still on the pond and the water level very close to the bottom of the Charles Street bridge, he is concerned that an ice jam could cause sudden flooding.

Water from the Charles Street dam millrace gushes through
the mill ruins on the former Mundell Lumber property. More photos below.

“Dams are being watched,” said Erin Road Superintendent Greg Delfosse. The water was above the concrete reinforcements of Hull’s Dam near Church Blvd., but the earthen berm was not eroding.

A high volume of water was passing under Main Street through the millrace chute that goes from the Charles Street dam to the old mill ruins on the former Mundell Lumber property, re-entering the river downstream of the Millwood bridge.

Just south of the Hillsburgh millpond, a section of Station Street was inundated with water on Feb. 20, leaving some large pieces of ice when it receded. Delfosse said it was due to heavy runoff combined with slow drainage through a culvert under the Elora Cataract Trailway into the millpond, an area where beavers have been active.

Tailwinds Bed and Breakfast, owned by Trevor Crystal and Janet Blanchard, is located at 17 Station Street near a small pond south of the trail. As rising water moved up their lawn, Crystal put out an urgent Facebook appeal.

“Anybody close to us, please bring sandbags and muscle to help save our home,” he said.

A “small army” of community volunteers, including staff from McKinnon Timber Mart, responded. About a dozen people built two short walls of sandbags with a pump between the rows.

The water was almost three feet deep in some areas, and although it reached the house, it did not breach the sandbags. By the next day, it was all gone.

“I cannot say enough about the amazing people in our community – thank-you so very much,” said Crystal in a follow-up posting.

The high volume of surface water overwhelmed storm drains on Main Street in the south end of Erin village for a short time on Feb. 20. Wellington Road 124 traffic continued to splash through several inches of water on the roadway.

Delfosse said many gravel roads in rural areas have had washout damage. Crews have put new gravel into some of the deepest holes, but roads are still too frozen to be regraded.

As of Feb. 21, the following roads were closed: 27 Sideroad between 10th Line and Winston Churchill Blvd., 1st Line south of County Road 124, 3rd Line from County Road 124 to 17 Sideroad, 4th Line from Wellington Road 50 to 10 Sideroad and 5th Line south of 17 Sideroad.