‘Screaming for something to be done’: NSW town repeatedly cut off by floods demands safe evacuation route

Residents of Pitt Town on the flood-prone Hawkesbury-Nepean River found their designated evacuation route cut by rising water last Wednesday, forcing authorities to locate a gate key to open up the only other path out of the historic centre.

That route has been partly under water twice again since Sunday, with another blockage possible on Tuesday amid yet more forecasts for heavy rain. The Bureau of Meteorology was predicting major flooding of the river, in places possibly exceeding both last week's highs and those of March 2021.

"We've been screaming for something to be done," Peter Ryan, the Pitt Town progress association president, told Guardian Australia.

"How many fatals do we have to have from this flood due to their lack of interest and total incompetence? Do we have to drown people in their cars trying to escape from here?"

Pitt Town turns into a series of islands every time there is a flood described as a "one-in-100-year event", meaning there is a 1% chance of that occurring in any year.

But the population has tripled in the past 15 years, increasing the number of residents who may need to evacuate from the area quickly.

"We want a safe, well-maintained flood evacuation route, which doesn't have the ability to be cut off by local water, which is what happened [last week]," Ryan said.

The usual evacuation route consists of several tight bends and is in places barely wide enough for vehicles to pass. The backup route, which has a locked gate and goes through part of a national park, is in an even poorer state - it has many potholes, no speed limits, and is usually only one-way given its narrowness.

"I had one mum contact me to say that she drove through [the backup evacuation route] with three kids, and she was just terrified, doing it on her own knowing she was responsible for her kids," Susan Templeman, the local federal Labor MP, said.

"You have got to wonder at how sensible it is to have a locked gate where only a limited number of people have a key to be your key escape route from what could be a very fast-rising flood. Imagine in the dark and in the rain."

The Hawkesbury council and the state emergency services minister, Steph Cooke, were approached for comment.

Mary Lyons-Buckett, a Hawkesbury councillor and former deputy mayor, called on authorities to create easier exits for residents.

"I have always believed the priority around flood management and safety of our people is the capacity to ensure they can evacuate safely and without impediment," Lyons-Buckett said. "We are seeing a lot of localised flooding and road closures. This makes it even more crucial to have designated effective routes to get people to safety."

Vince Rayfield, secretary of the Pitt Town progress association, said their group had been repeatedly rebuffed in their efforts to get documents from authorities detailing how much time the local community needed to escape in case of a worst-case flood scenario.

After the previous state Labor government changed the planning laws in 2006, Pitt Town had more than 1,000 additional development lots created. Most of them have been taken up.

Ryan said another threat is that it only takes one tree to be blown over - and damaging winds are forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday from the east coast low - to block even those two inadequate routes out.

"It's getting to the stage we're just going to have to have a chainsaw in the back of our cars," he said.The challenges for local drivers have also increased because the privately owned local sewage works has little demand for its treated recycled water for local gardens. As a result, huge tankers come and go constantly.

"You wouldn't want to be behind one of those if it rolled," Ryan said.