All affected families petition UBND of HCMC to compensate them for “damages” to their homes from street repair works. If HCM City say “no” then they should think aout suing the City in Court.- PTH.
Phan Van Ket watches the waist-high water in the alley through the window of his house.
VNE – By Quynh Tran November 20, 2023 | 09:17 am GMT+7
The “upgrading” of a street along Lo Gom Canal in HCMC’s District 8 has left its houses lower than the road level, meaning floods inundate the homes every time it rains.
The five-year upgrading of Phu Dinh Street in District 8 has raised the street 0.5-1.3 meters above the level of its homes’ foundations, which in turn causes them to flood when it rains.
Those who can afford it have raised the foundation of their houses, which has in turn caused even more flooding in the homes that remain unraised.
In some cases, people have also built walls in front of their houses to shield them from flood waters.
Nguyen Thi Loi, 86, climbs down the stairs she had built in front of her house to shield it from rising waters during storms.
She said her family has lifted the house’s foundation twice, but it is still around half a meter lower than the street.
“It’s not easy at all because my joints hurt and I have to make every move very slowly and carefully.”
The raised road also blocks natural light from entering the home, so Loi has to keep electric lights on all day every day.
And even after the modification, the house still floods when rains are heavy enough to cause overflow from the adjacent canal. When that happens, her family resorts to pumping water out their property using a machine pump.
Thai My Nga, 58, drives a motorbike down to the porch in front of her house.
Nga said her family has not been able to raise their home’s foundation so catching water in their large porch is their only option.
However, the porch can’t stop the floods from entering their house.
“High tides usually come in the final months of the year so the two pumps at home must run on a regular basis.”
Tran Thi Thu Tam stands in front of her dark, inundated house, which is around 0.5 m lower than the street.
Having grown up in this home, Tam said the house was 1 meter higher than the street when she was a little girl, but now it’s always damp and lightless.
Phan Van Ket places burning incense sticks on the altar in what used to be the living room of his house.
With the flood waters, his family raised the foundation of the rest of the house, but not the living room.
On the evening of Nov. 14, high tides sent water all the way down an alley off Phu Dinh Street.
In this photo, Ket watches the waist-high water in the alley through the window of his house.
“This alley is extremely low and when it comes to high tides and heavy rains it is like a pond. Sometimes it takes a week for the water to recede,” he said.
Living at the end of the alley, Phan Thi Sau, 68, wades through flood waters in her home to boil water.
The regularly-flooded bathroom of Sau’s house.
“We built walls on the sides of the house but they haven’t helped much,” she said.
Most families in the alley have raised the foundations of their houses, built walls, or blocked their homes’ entrances with sand bags. Many have to use water pump machines to prevent or minimize flooding when it rains.
Vendors on the street have built their stores like stilt houses so that they can still do business when Phu Dinh Street floods.
CVD 