beijing's 2024 flood season rainfall is higher than normal. why are 60% of citizens' demands decreasing instead of increasing?
2024-09-23
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during the 2024 flood season, many citizens felt that there was too much rain. according to the beijing meteorological bureau, during this year's flood season, the average rainfall in the city was 60% higher than the same period in previous years, ranking third in the same period since 1961. faced with more rainfall and changeable weather than in the past, the number of calls from citizens regarding flood-related issues such as leaking rainwater and backflow of accumulated water has decreased year-on-year. this is inseparable from the preparations before the flood season and the rapid response during the flood season.
the maintenance group staff urgently drained the rainwater that had gathered in the sunken bridge area.
sunken bridge area
half a meter deep water can be drained in 9 minutes
tonghuai road is a major traffic artery connecting tongzhou district and huairou district. the songzhuang section of the first highway division of beijing construction engineering maintenance group is responsible for the maintenance of 21 kilometers of roads and more than 20 bridge areas. based on a comprehensive summary of the rescue experience and problems of the heavy rainstorm disasters in the 2023 flood season, beijing construction engineering maintenance group revised the "flood control emergency plan". he xin, the section chief of the songzhuang section, said that the comprehensive upgrade of the early warning mechanism and rescue equipment during the 2024 flood season rescue process was the biggest change.
on august 17, a sudden rainstorm made all relevant departments of flood prevention work busy. dinggezhuang bridge was in a dangerous situation with rapidly rising water. according to the on-site situation, the cause of the water accumulation was that the sewage pipeline laid along the auxiliary road suddenly overflowed, the sewage manhole cover was opened, and sewage gushed out, forming an emergency situation of "three waters converging into one surface" for a time. the so-called "three waters" refer to the rainwater that falls on the bridge area, the sewage that emerges from the bottom, and the "guest water" that flows from the surrounding areas. "the accumulated water on the auxiliary road continues to spread to the main road, and the catchment area reaches 110 square meters." he xin said.
there are three key bridge areas in the songzhuang section of tonghuai road, and dinggezhuang bridge area is one of them. he xin said that the reason for marking the key points is that these bridge areas involve sunken motor vehicle main roads. if the accumulated water is not handled in time, the lanes will become rivers, and the safety of life and property of citizens will be greatly threatened.
when the rescuers arrived at the scene, the water on the auxiliary road was 39 centimeters deep, with the deepest reaching 52 centimeters. the heavy rain was still pouring down, and the accumulated water poured down the concave main road like a small waterfall. decisive measures must be taken. according to the requirements of flood rescue, the road must be closed when the water reaches 27 centimeters deep. according to the command and dispatch of the front and rear, the rescuers on the scene urgently closed the auxiliary road in dinggezhuang bridge district. according to calculations, the deepest part of the water on the main road was 18 centimeters. the rescuers diverted the traffic on the main road and immediately started drainage operations.
in the songzhuang section, the pumping capacity of the pump station can reach 1.66 cubic meters per second, and the water accumulation rate of the "three waters converging into one surface" on site reached 4.25 cubic meters per second. thanks to the equipment upgrade, the crisis was effectively resolved. he xin said that in 2024, the songzhuang section added a dragon-sucking drainage rescue vehicle. with the help of the new equipment, it only took 9 minutes to drain the accumulated water in the dinggezhuang bridge area.
it is understood that a lot of preparatory work had been done in the songzhuang section long before the flood season. for example, a large number of rain grates on tonghuai road were changed from being parallel to the road surface to being inclined, and the diameter of the water collection port was increased from 400 mm to 800 mm; a new 3-meter-long barricade was added. in an emergency, two barricades can be closed to quickly close the dangerous road. more importantly, the new early warning mechanism in 2024 has won precious time for relevant parties to quickly command and dispatch and support rescue. based on the functions of the command and dispatch platform, beijing construction engineering maintenance group has developed a flood control and rescue information system. various types of information such as flood control teams, emergency supplies, standby, and rescue can be checked at any time and transmitted in real time by relevant departments. as a result, relevant departments such as the tongzhou district highway branch and the district emergency bureau can simultaneously grasp the rescue situation on the scene at the first time.
he xin told reporters that due to the full preparation and full staff on standby during the flood season, no other emergencies occurred during the entire flood season this year, except for the emergency in dinggezhuang bridge district. therefore, they also have spare capacity to support emergency rescue tasks in other areas according to the deployment of their superiors.
the reporter learned from beijing construction engineering maintenance group that a total of 4,028 rescue personnel and 1,013 sets of mechanical equipment were dispatched for rescue missions during the flood season this year. a total of 158 dangerous situations were handled, including 24 landslides, 9,481 cubic meters of fallen rocks were cleared, 118 waterlogged roads were handled, and 165,860 cubic meters of water were pumped. all emergencies did not cause casualties.
multiple ownership public housing
pursuing the payment of maintenance fee to repair the leaking roof
building no. 12 in pu'anxili, fengtai district, was built in the 1990s and has a total of 77 households. in the past two years, due to the aging of the waterproof layer, the problem of leaking rain on the top and second top floors of the building has gradually become prominent. during the flood season last year, residents of the building reported 46 leaking rain complaints through the 12345 hotline. during the flood season this year, with the concerted efforts of the street and relevant departments, building no. 12 in pu'anxili successfully completed the roof waterproofing overhaul project, and the number of complaints due to roof leaks dropped to 0.
on september 18, the reporter came to pu'anxili community. residents praised the waterproof renovation: "after the waterproofing was completed this year, the roof has withstood the test of several heavy rains." "the house is no longer leaking, and we feel at ease." resident mr. yang recalled that in previous years, when the flood season came, there would be serious leaks in the corridors and residents' homes on the top floor, and the rain would even flow down several floors along the corridor walls. the corridor walls of each unit have a lot of traces of being washed by rain, which makes everyone worried every year during the flood season.
an overhaul of the roof waterproofing layer is imminent, but how to raise funds has become a big problem. shi limei, secretary of the party committee of pu'anli first community, told reporters that originally building 12 was all public housing, with at least 7 property rights units. after the housing reform and housing sales, some houses changed hands several times, and information such as public maintenance funds was unclear. "when we counted last year, we found that 32 of the 77 houses were still public housing, and the property rights units could be found. and nearly half of the remaining 45 commercial houses had incomplete public maintenance fund information. who the former public housing property rights units were and whether the public maintenance funds were paid when they were first sold all need to be clarified bit by bit."
so since last year, the staff of the street and community have divided into several groups, urging the property units to complete the payment of funds for all staff dormitories as soon as possible, and assisting the residents who bought houses to inquire about the missing fund deposit information. shi limei said: "initially, these houses were allocated to employees of relevant units, so sometimes we need to assist the current owners to keep looking forward. often, we can only get some vague information about the property units after contacting the children of the first owners, and then inquire about the current situation of this unit based on this information." after more than half a year of inquiry, except for the remaining 5 houses whose public maintenance fund payment information could not be found, the rest of the public maintenance funds have been paid in full. considering the approaching rainy season, the street finally decided to use the existing public maintenance funds and the street to use the complaint handling funds to make up for the funding gap and start the overhaul of the waterproof layer of building 12.
since may this year, the community has worked with all parties to successfully complete home visits, residential safety assessments and special maintenance fund applications, and completed construction and budget announcements as required. before the main flood season, the waterproof layer of the roof of building 12 in pu'anxili was fully renovated.
based on the principle of "solving a whole category of issues through one thing", and after referring to the experience of finding the property rights unit and historical information of public maintenance funds in building no. 12, pu'anxili, dongtiejiangying street began to comprehensively sort out the public maintenance fund payment information of old communities within its jurisdiction, so that these communities can smoothly activate public maintenance funds when needed.
rainwater backflow into the community
redesigning the drainage system to cure the stubborn problem of waterlogging
yuquan jiayuan community in haidian district was completed and occupied in 2014. every year during the flood season, the backflow of rainwater in the community and the accumulation of water on the roads outside the community are a worry for residents. from the perspective of topography, the area around the community is high in the north and low in the south. however, only tiancunshan south road on the north side is a municipal road, and the other three sides are temporary cement roads with no drainage pipelines. the community drainage system cannot be connected to the external municipal pipelines. every time it rains heavily, the water in the community first flows along the terrain to the road in the south. the water on the road cannot be drained out and finally flows back into the community.
wei lei, secretary of the party committee of yuquan jiayuan community, introduced that every year during the flood season, the street community will make preparations early and arrange pumping and drainage equipment in advance. they dug an open channel beside yuquan middle road, first gathered the rainwater into the ditch, and then used the pumping and drainage equipment to drain the water into the nearby temporary pipeline. however, the temporary pipeline is relatively thin, and it is already stretched to the limit to discharge the road surface water, and it can no longer take on the rainwater in the community. therefore, although the terrain is high in the north and low in the south, we have to find a way to drain the water into the drainage pipeline of the municipal road on the north side. "we need to pull more than 200 meters of water hoses and 8 pumps running at the same time. even so, we have to pump and drain continuously for at least 2 hours when it rains heavily." the travel and life of more than 2,500 households in the community are greatly affected. residents frequently complain, but the stubborn problem of waterlogging has been difficult to cure.
it is understood that yuquan middle road and yuquan north street around yuquan garden belong to haidian district, while yuquan west street is located at the junction of haidian district and shijingshan district. last year, yuquan west street was jointly funded and completed by the two districts.
liu fang, section chief of the urban management office of tiancun road subdistrict, said that in order to solve the problem of waterlogging, the subdistrict applied for a proactive governance project. the subdistrict "blew the whistle" to coordinate multiple departments to optimize the design plan. district leaders conducted on-site research and held more than ten on-site meetings and coordination meetings, and finally clarified the responsibilities of all parties and the specific plan for road improvement.
the construction focus is to build new rainwater pipelines along yuquan north street and yuquan middle road, and connect them with the pipelines already reserved on yuquan west street. the location of the rain grates has also been planned in detail. "the northernmost end of yuquan north street, where it intersects with tiancunshan south road, has a large slope. when it rains, all the rainwater flows southward along the slope. so this time, we specially added rain grates here to allow the rainwater flowing south to flow directly into the rainwater pipeline." liu fang said.
the renovation started at the beginning of this year. to ensure the residents' travel during the rainy season, the construction workers completed the construction of the rainwater pipeline in june. the drainage pipeline in the community was also connected to the road pipeline in early july. wei lei said that the two pipelines in the community are located on the east and south sides respectively. the drainage outlet on the south side was connected smoothly, but the east side was "unreachable".
it turns out that yuquan west street on the east side of the community was newly built last year. in addition to the rainwater pipeline, other pipelines were laid under the road. the lines are complicated and difficult to change. if you want to connect the community's drainage pipeline to yuquan west street, the technical difficulty is high and the workload is large. in order to make progress before the flood season, the local authorities negotiated and adjusted the plan many times, and decided to first lay a new rainwater pipeline on the south side of the community to improve drainage efficiency. with the two drainage pipelines on the south side, the governance has begun to show results. a resident compared the photos of the rainy season in the past two years and said to the reporter: "look, how deep the water was before, it was above the knee. the rain this year is not small, but there has been no rain backflow."
the relevant work did not stop there. the staff continued to study how to connect the east side pipeline and finally decided to adopt the method of pipe jacking construction. after nearly a month, the east side pipeline was also completed and put into use recently. "now that the three pipelines in the community are connected, the drainage effect will definitely be better during the flood season next year." residents are full of expectations for this.
beijing daily reporter chen shengyu, jing yiming, lu yijia wrote and photographed
journalist's notes
be prepared for danger in times of peace and plan for the long term
on september 15, the flood season in beijing ended. solving the problem of leaking houses, repairing water-damaged roads, and managing the difficulties of waterlogging... during this year's flood season, the whole city tightened its sense of responsibility, checked for leaks and filled in the gaps in the flood prevention chain, and tried its best to answer the flood prevention test paper.
flood prevention is a systematic project that often involves a large number of people and complex situations. beijing promptly summarized the experience of the "23.7" heavy rainstorm last year, reinforced water conservancy projects, upgraded urban infrastructure, and strengthened urban resilience. from rolling forecasts and timely release of early warning information to gain more lead time for flood prevention work, to systematic, scientific, and precise dispatch of flood prevention forces, it has effectively responded to the test of multiple rounds of rainstorms since the beginning of the flood season and ensured the normal operation of the city to the greatest extent.
although the test has been passed safely, we cannot relax yet. there is still more practical and detailed work to be done. for example, many leaky houses, flooded roads, and water-damaged facilities need to be "treated in summer and autumn" in the window period after the flood season and before winter. we should accumulate experience and optimize plans from the flood season, strengthen the foundation, make up for shortcomings, and strengthen strengths in a targeted manner. we should work hard in normal times to build a solid urban safety barrier, so that we can calmly respond to the storm again and protect the safety of the area.
the key to flood prevention is "prevention". in a sense, we are "always on the road" to deal with meteorological disasters. only by taking precautions and planning for the long term can we move forward steadily on the road to building a safe, livable and resilient city. beijing daily reporter sun yan'an
