Wagga City Council calls for city to become eligible for Infrastructure Betterment Fund to flood proof local roads

Eunony Bridge Road and Hampden Avenue remain closed to traffic after they were submerged by the latest bout of flooding from the Murrumbidgee River.

Wagga City Council director of infrastructure services Warren Faulkner said both are scheduled to open on Friday once emergency roadworks are complete.

"Part of the problem is these roads have been inundated, Eunony Bridge was substantially damaged, scoured and things like that" he said.

"Hampden Avenue in particular was saturated, so whenever the road's saturated, there's no strength to the pavement and so we need those roads to dry out to them some strength back in and to carry the traffic."

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A culvert under Hampden Avenue also separated, creating a hole in the road which needed repairing before the road was opened.

Mr Faulkner said despite some roads still underwater and yet to be assessed for damage, the estimated reapir cost is already "in the order of millions".

"We know there's others - Mundowy Lane for example, is still underwater and has been underwater for months, so we have no idea what it's like but... expecting it's not going to be good there," he said.

"We're looking at several hundreds of thousands of dollars for that road in particular."

The State Emergency Service deputy incident controller for the southern zone Shane Hargrave said more rain was forecast again for the region, and may hinder council's urgent repair works.

"Councils are concerned right across the whole area really about the impact for road structures," he said.

"The issue is with the amount of rainfall that's continuing to come through, particularly this Sunday and into Monday, it really dampens their ability to get that work done."

The bill to fix the council's roads after the 2012 flood came to about $30 million, which accounted for more widespread damage than the October flood.

This time, Mr Faulkner said council is also looking at ways to flood proof some roads like Eunony Bridge Road which regularly flood.

He said they were looking to possibly concrete the sections of roads that normally go under during flooding to eliminate constant repairs.

"Council is certainly looking at how we can better the roads to be more resilient to these flood water effects," Mr Faulkner said.

"One of the things that needs to be looked at is making the Sturt Highway, in particular, more flood resilient. There's no doubt that diverting highway traffic via local roads such as Coolamon Road, Bakers Lane and Inglewood Road has a significant impact on our road network."

The Sturt Highway comes under state government jurisdiction.

Mr Faulkner said council was applying for state and federal government funding to upgrade local roads, including grants from the natural disaster declaration.

He said council would also advocate for Wagga's local government area to be made eligible for the Infrastructure Betterment Fund, in order to fund flood resilience road upgrades.

"The government has recognised that this is an eastern seaboard problem, not just a specific area," Mr Faulkner said.

"Councils have been pushing for betterment as part of flood claims for a number of years now and it's good to see that's starting to come through to try and minimise the impacts associated with flood recovery."

Eunony Bridge Road, Hampden Avenue and Boorooma Street are among the roads council is considering to nominate as high priority for flood resilience works.

Hampden Avenue is scheduled to reopen at 7am on Friday, November 11. Emergency works on Eunony Bridge Road are also expected to be completed on Friday.

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