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K. Karamanlis: Flood protection projects over 1.5 billion euros, with respect for the environment

The Minister of Infrastructure and Transport, Mr. Costas Karamanlis, referred to the course of the implementation of the flood protection works in Kifissos and Platis Potamos of Crete, answering earlier in the Parliament a topical question of the MP of MERA25 Kriton Arsenis.

“Because there was a huge disaster in Kifissos, the Central Administration came after a suggestion and proposal of the Region and said that it will repair the very big damage.”

He clarified, in fact, that the contract for the study was signed on February 4, 2019, and concerns the arrangement of the Kifissos river section from the Three Bridges to the Red Mill and from the Red Mill to the Attiki Odos projects, where they are often presented flood problems, with serious risks to homes and businesses in the area as demonstrated in 2015.

Mr. Karamanlis stated that to date the hydrological study and the environmental impact study have been prepared and submitted to the Services of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport, while since December 2020 the environmental impact study has been submitted to the Ministry of Environment, where it is in consultation. opinions.

“We, as the Ministry, are waiting for the approval of the environmental conditions, and when we receive them we will take all the necessary steps to complete the projects”, stressed the Minister of Infrastructure and Transport and added that “property and human lives will be protected, but also the environment, in Kifissos “.

Mr. Karamanlis underlined that according to the hydrological study of the Ministry of Environment it becomes clear that the existing sections of Kifissos up to Attiki Odos, in case of heavy rainfall, are expected to overflow, with the risks that this entails.

“This Government has proved especially in this case that it is moving with very careful steps”, stressed Mr. Karamanlis and added that “already the flood protection works that are done all over Greece exceed 1.5 billion euros”, noting that: “We have to find the golden section between protecting property and lives, but without making major interventions in the environment.”

He noted, in fact, that what is valid in other European cities cannot be applied in Kifissos, because Kifissos has a very small cross section, is located within the urban fabric and a large part of it is closed.

“It is strange to accuse us of fast track procedures. When we do not do fast track procedures you say why we are flooding and mourning human lives. And when we do fast track, you accuse us of not following the procedures and of taking away what is left green,” he said. Mr. Karamanlis informed that in the study, which has been submitted by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport to the Ministry of Environment, among other things, tree planting is proposed in the riparian area along the projects.

Mr. Karamanlis assured the Greek Parliament that the anti-flood projects totaling 1.5 billion euros throughout the country are carried out with great attention to the environment. “We want to protect the environment, but we also want to protect property and human lives, in an area that is extremely problematic, such as Kifissos. We need state interventions to avoid the worst,” he said.

Earlier, MEPA25 MP Kriton Arsenis said that the last natural part of Kifissos is in danger of undergoing catastrophic operations, both in terms of deforestation, but also in terms of alteration of its natural riverbed, rockslides and all kinds of contracting interventions . “You will tell me: ‘What should we do? We must save, Mr. Arseni, the people from the floods. We had a flood that cost the lives of four people”, continued the MEPA25 MP to underline: “the study on floods what will level what has remained natural in Kifissos, from Kokkino Mylos to Attiki Odos, cost 1.5 million euros, has no updated data.Based on 1999 maps. It does not include recent floods, nor even recent projects, for example, those of the Douros administration that cost € 9 million. It also violates two directives, the Water Framework Directive 2000/60 and the Floods Directive 2007/60, as well as European Commission Resolution 2013/249. “It violates the European Union strategy that obliges us to restore the free flow of rivers by 2030, something that your Government has not even legislated to date.”

I do not disagree that the flood risk is huge “, continued Kriton Arsenis and added:” the flood risk is huge, when you make cement and therefore the flood load is not absorbed at all and remains and becomes a turbine in this concrete corridor. The flood risk is huge, when you have -as you have- all the depots of the municipalities in the wider stream and that is about why it became the container that left and closed the bridge at ISAP. This is how the big flood of 2015 took place that cost the lives of four people, not because you had a natural river. Respectively in 2019 in the wire boxes, in the part where you had intervened again with the wire boxes, they dissolved and blocked the flow of the river and a flood was created.

In other words, we see that flood defenses are being done completely on the wrong technology and basis, in ways that have been surpassed throughout Europe, and yet you keep telling us that you are giving 1.5 billion euros to do this, not just in Kifissos, but also in Pikrodafni and in the mega stream of Rafina and in Erasinos, in natural and protected streams, these are the ones that cause the floods, Mr. Minister. I’m worried twice over here. I’m worried about this project, for which the public consultation is over, and I’m worried about this project as much as it means destroying one of the last natural waterways in the city and I’m worried about this project, because it means -with the way you do it – increase the risk of flooding. “Keep it, because you will remember me in the future.”

Source: AMPE

Source: Capital

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