Council commercial operations director Caroline Angel said the project had been “well planned” and was making "good progress" towards a defence against the kind of floods seen in North Queensland this month. 

“There has been significant design and planning put into it with the tightness in certain areas relating to (the levee’s) building and footprint, we have the sheetpiling put in place.” she said.

Contractors are in the process of driving 30 horizontal metres of metal sheetpiling per day into the earth along the Murrumbidgee River to raise the height of the levee.

The levee upgrade design will include 1.8 kilometres of metal sheetpiling along 6km of the upgraded length to raise the height while preserving available land near homes and businesses.

About 3000 metal sheets will be installed from Sturt Street to Cadell Place.

Council senior project manager Darryl Woods said the upgrades involved three types of levee construction involving earth, concrete and the sheetpiling.

"It does change as we move along the levee depending on the different characteristics of the levee and how much room we have to work with," he said.

"The metal sheets of a standard variety that is used to make wharves or underneath bridges to make land embankments.

"They interlock and there will probably be a bit of seepage between them but on the whole they are fairly well waterproof."

The metal sheets will be cut to appropriate size and capped with concrete, with a demonstration site for the community set up at Tarcutta Street as a preview for how the upgraded levee will look.  

Ms Angel commended the Wagga community for their support of the project despite noise and access restrictions.

“A project of this size will have impacts,” she said.

“We have done letterbox drops and we have held community information sessions and we continue to reduce the impact as much as we possibly can.

“It is a critical piece of infrastructure for the city to protect the main CBD from flooding into the future.”

The council is also building a new concrete wall at Crampton Street and Cadell Place car park with new stairs and a mobility access ramp.

The nearby Knights Meats & Deli butcher has complained that they have suffered a 30 per cent decline in business due to the car park’s closure.

Ms Angel said the closure was required for a safe work site.

“It’’s a requirement so that we can work safely and reduce the likelihood of conflict between heavy vehicles, trucks and equipment.

“The car park, unfortunately, had to be closed. We are doing quite a significant piece of work there.

“It’s putting reinforcement against the levee, which is the concrete wall and the accessibility ramp that will allow people to safely get onto and off the levee and steps for those who wish to run up there.”

The council contributed $7.75m to the works with the federal and state governments funding the rest of the upgrade, which began its final stage on January 7.

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