Residents Want More Details on Flood Control

A handful of Bellaire residents attended a public hearing Monday on an update of the city of Bellaire’s Comprehensive Plan, suggesting that any plans for the future should include more details about ways to alleviate flooding.
The Bellaire City Council held the hearing and will consider adopting the revised Comprehensive Plan at a meeting in mid-September. The council can consider written comments on the lengthy revision of the city’s 2009 Comprehensive Plan which are submitted by noon on September 10, 2015.
Bellaire residents Charles Platt and Richard Franke strongly suggested that the plan should include more detail about the city of Bellaire’s future plans to deal with flooding. About 250 Bellaire homes were flooded during the recent Memorial Day storm when Brays Bayou went over its banks.
Platt said he had spent the weekend reviewing the proposal.
He said that the revision is “superficial” in some places, particularly as it relates to flooding issues.
“Only minor additions have been made since the 2008 Stormwater Improvement Plan. It’s certainly something that should be addressed,” Platt said.
Platt also suggested that the plan should include more detail about the city’s plans to install sidewalks and bikeways.
Franke also said that the plan fails to adequately address flooding in Bellaire.
“I think this plan is rather vacant,” Franke said. “It talks about drainage and flood control, but it doesn’t really address what should be done about it.”
Bellaire resident Lynn McBee gave the lengthy plan a negative critique, saying that the plan is “entirely too long.” McBee also criticized the numerous graphics in the plan, complaining about “too much color” in charts, tables, photos and maps. She also noted that the use of white typeface on a brown background “strains the normal eye.” And, McBee also complained that the page numbers in the Comprehensive Plan were difficult to understand. (The plan, if counted by hand, is 108 pages long.)
McBee gave the City Council members six pages of her own notes on suggested revisions to the plan.