Waters recede, but storm shows
South Shore environmental threat
The weekend downpours were relatively kind to the South Shore, and by Tuesday, many residents were enjoying the sunshine and hints of spring.
Rainfall over the weekend ranged from 3 to 6 inches in most communities near the ocean, but was as high as high as 8.4 inches in Hingham, according to the website Hinghamweather.com.
Most of the damage in Hingham involved roads, said Randy Sylvester, superintendent of the Department of Public Works.
“There were a lot of potholes created by the rain. We're out there repairing them now--about two or three crews,’’ he said early Tuesday afternoon. “We're also pumping certain areas....We'll be working on this for the next week or so."
In Scituate, several low-lying streets near the harbor -- such as Edward Foster Road and Front Street -- were swamped on Monday. But by yesterday, everything was back to normal, said a spokeswoman for the Scituate police.
Norwell’s Fire Department responded to 20 calls Sunday and Monday to pump out flooded basements, said Jack Suurhans, the town’s deputy police chief .
Suurhans said the flooding was not concentrated in any particular area, and that there were also sporadic reports of fallen trees and power lines around Norwell.
The Indian Head River in Hanover, a tributary of the North River, rose about five feet from Saturday to Monday, according to the US Geological Survey, but began receding Tuesday.
“The only other storm that we could compare this to would be the Mother’s Day storm in 2006,’’ said Samantha Woods, executive director of the North and South Rivers Watershed Association.
Woods, who said the government began tracking these statistics in the late 1960s, estimated Tuesday afternoon that the North River could return to normal within 36 hours.
The flooding did prompt the state Division of Marine Fisheries to close the shellfishing flats along the North River near the Driftway in Scituate. During heavy rains, stormwater carries contaminants into the flats, and this tidal river needs several cycles of tides to clean out the water.
The flats will be reopened after the state tests the water and finds it safe. Scituate’s shellfish warden, Joe Strazdes, expects the flats to be closed about five days, Town Clerk Bernice Brown said Tuesday.
The pollution of the shellfish flats illustrates a broader problem facing the river, said Woods. In Scituate, Norwell, and Marshfield, homes are set well back from the North River itself, but the small tributaries flood more quickly in recent years because there’s more pavement in the watershed, she said.
‘’All this rain has just washed all sorts of awful stuff off our pavement, particularly the sand we put down for wintertime storms, along with the oil and everything that drips off our cars,’’ said Woods.
‘’We’re constantly concerned about it, but this an extreme, where everything that accumulated over the winter gets flushed into the river,’’ said Woods. “Some of it will just do downstream, because it’s moving pretty fast. But if it hits a quiet body of water, like a pond, it’ll settle there and accumulate, which is what it’s been doing for years.
Though all the long-term effects of such accumulation aren’t known, Wood said, “clearly at some point, you smother the stream channel with sediments, and at some point it becomes toxic.’’
Woods noted that the US Environmental Protection Agency this month is seeking public comments on new stormwater rules. The NSRWA is advocating reduced paving surfaces for new and redeveloped construction, and for better storm drain systems.
“It’s one of those out-of-sight, out of mind’’ issues, said Woods. ‘’But we’re trying to get the public to comment on it.’’
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