When things get soggy, Sligo Creek residents resolutely slog onward

Wednesday, July 5, 2006

by Agnes Jasinski

Staff Writer

Amy Cassagnol had little knowledge of her Takoma Park home’s history before buying the hilltop dwelling. It wasn’t until she met her neighbors that she realized what she moved her family into — a house built directly above an underground stream.

‘‘According to our neighbors, who lived there as kids, it was built right on a swamp,” she said.

Cassagnol lives directly across from the entrance of the Sligo Creek Park bike path in a neighborhood of older properties close to the creek and its buried tributaries. Both make real estate there prime for floods.

Longtime residents have learned to look at damp basements as a price of living along the 8.3-mile waterway, and have developed tricks to prevent further damage. The storm system that dumped more than a foot of rain on Maryland last week and forced evacuations in many parts of the Northeast was no exception for seasoned flood survivors.

Cassagnol outsmarted the most recent storm with a makeshift drain her husband dug out after years of watching water seep underneath their front door and down into their basement.

Many houses along the creek were designed with stairwells leading down into the basement, which became funnels after big rainstorms, she said. This time around, the angled drain outside the basement door helped divert the water into their sump pump, a suction device used most often to remove water from basements.

But the storm still kept Cassagnol on her toes, and out of bed.

‘‘Good thing I’ve got four boys. We sent them out with the shovels, brooms, plungers... We were up all night,” she said, making sure silt and debris weren’t clogging the sump pump drains.

Juliet Mellow, a resident of a Wheaton neighborhood along the creek, said her home always floods, even during storms much weaker than the last. After last week’s heavy rains, her rugs were sopping wet, her basement floor was covered in mud, and her husband’s Sebring convertible had to be sent to the dealership for repairs to the dashboard, which shorted out after hours of water damage.

But Mellow has learned to find the humor in floods. Watching her family chase the garbage can floating down Nairn Road the Sunday night of the storm lightened her mood, she said. Her street looked more like a river that night, and many of her neighbors’ cars were flooded as well.

‘‘We’ve seen much worse,” Mellow said, recalling the floods after Hurricane Isabel hit that kept her children out of school. ‘‘The basement of the house we lived in before this one flooded too.”

Sligo Creek runs through one of the most urbanized areas of the Anacostia River system. Increased erosion, exposed sewer pipes and disrupted stream flow can all contribute to a higher risk of flooding, said Masaya Maeda, a water quality specialist with the Anacostia Watershed Society based in Bladensburg.

Ed Murtagh, stormwater committee chair for the Friends of Sligo Creek, said the creek will be feeling the damage caused by the storm — undermined trails, blocked roadways, fallen trees — for a long time before park officials can return the area to its previous state.

But keeping residents alongside the stream dry will always be a struggle, he said. The problem has existed since the 1960s when developers were given exemptions to build on floodplains, Murtagh said.

‘‘There’s a lot going on underground that people don’t realize,” said Murtagh, who lives near the northwest end of the stream. ‘‘When developers ran out of good land to build on, they started building on the marginal lands. Most people have no inkling their homes were built over tributaries.”

Flooded basements weren’t the only problem for creek residents after the storm. Zeb Ramsey, who lives at Sligo Parkway and New Hampshire Avenue, said his commute to work was a bigger hassle than flooding after park officials closed down the waterlogged roads.

Yet despite the heavy traffic, there were only a few accidents reported during the worst of the storm.

‘‘It helps that people were being more careful,” said Carol Bannerman, a spokeswoman for the Takoma Park Police Department. ‘‘They just stopped driving once it got really bad.”

Residents with damaged property who did call police and fire departments were routed to private contractors. Virginia-based MER⁄Morrison Waterproofing Contractors, Inc., has stopped taking work orders at its Maryland office until further notice because of a backlog of jobs in the area.

Many along the creek have already taken it upon themselves to make their homes storm-ready. After the last heavy rainfall, Ramsey built a makeshift ditch around his home to prevent water from coming into the basement through his windows. He also has a sump pump on hand to siphon excess water, a must for residents along the creek.

Cassagnol is grateful their family was one of the lucky ones. And despite the need for constant vigilance when heavy rains hit, her family is staying put in the swamp house they made their home.

‘‘We know how to trick it now,” she said of keeping the water out with her new drainage technique. ‘‘Sure, we’ve thought of moving. But we’ve put a lot of money into this house.”

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