Greater South Dunedin Action Group president Ray Macleod commented last night after more than 40 people attended a 4pm public meeting in the Blind Foundation Rooms in Hillside Rd yesterday.
"South Dunedin is in the national consciousness as a community in trouble," Mr Macleod said.
The Action Group wanted to use this interest in South Dunedin’s welfare and future to the community’s advantage by seeking to work with the "appropriate parties" to help people in the Greater South Dunedin area.
The group had already been in contact with Climate Change Minister James Shaw and hoped to meet him early next year to discuss matters further.
Mr Macleod said he was encouraged that Dunedin City Council officials had been considering potential engineering solutions which could increase South Dunedin’s ability to remove storm water in much greater amounts to counter potential flooding.
He had met DCC chief executive Sue Bidrose last Thursday, and at the meeting he outlined potential engineering steps being considered by DCC officials that could greatly increase stormwater removal capacity.
One option was to install a large underground stormwater pipe to increase the stormwater drainage capacity up to four-fold.
The current drainage system would effectively be divided in two. Some stormwater would be discharged at Musselburgh and some at a second outfall.
Another possibility was to restore a creek in a small canal-like body of water linking some existing green spaces and parks in the South Dunedin area.
Potential costs could eventually range from about $20 million to about $38 million, the meeting heard.
