ROCHESTER, N.Y. — People along Lake Ontario are bracing for a repeat of flooding like what happened in 2017, as water levels are less than a foot away from flood stage.
News10NBC’s Garrett Chan spoke with several businesses on the lakeshore about their next steps. Business owners along Edgemere Drive said they’re not too concerned about the rising water levels.
“I mean right now it’s not too bad when we do get north wind…a little scary down here but we haven’t had any problems yet,” said Larry Meissner, manager at The Original Charbroil House.
Larry and other businesses said while they’re not doing anything right now to brace for the rising water, they hope their properties don’t look like they did during the 2017 flooding. The flooding closed many roads in the area.
“It did close a lot of the roads here. This intersection, like I said, at Edgemere and Cottage, was underwater for most of the season. And they had, you know, splash over on Edgemere here from Duck Pond and it was literally in the street. So a lot of this, it was hard to get down there,” Larry said.
A manager at Schallers said the flooding affected business in 2017 because customers couldn’t get through the flooded roads. Larry said even though they’re more inland, being surrounded by a few bodies of water still presents potential problems.
“If you look at aerial view down here, there’s not much land between the pond and lake. You don’t want to see those two come together. Not a pleasant view,” Larry said.
While business owners don’t anticipate much impact, they are concerned about neighbors who live along the lakeshore. At this time last year, the International Joint Committee said Lake Ontario levels were around two feet from flood stage of 247.3 feet.
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