The long-awaited solution to prevent future flooding in Albufeira's downtown area has been announced a year after the November 1st 2015 deluge caused €25 million of damage to the city’s downtown area: a tunnel.
This underground structure will serve to divert the flow of Albufeira’s seasonal river away from the town into the sea as part of series of measures that will take well over a decade to complete and remain uncosted.
This five metre diameter tunnel has a cost estimate of 'about €15 million' but is just part of a wide-ranging series of proposed interventions costing between €30 million and €40 million between 2017 and 2030.
The tunnel project will be led by Professor José Saldanha Matos from the Higher Technical Institute who will be hired by Albufeira council.
The professor and his team have worked on similar projects in in Barcelona, Paris and in Lisbon and will be drawing on expertise at the National Civil Engineering Laboratory, the University of the Algarve, the Portuguese Environment Agency and engineers at Albufeira council.
Subsequent parts of an overall flood defence plan will be to install water collection points in areas of the city, a pumping station on Rua Candido dos Reis street and a smaller relief tunnel tunnel taking rain water to the Inatel hotel area.
The thirteen year target date for the completion of these works should ensure that the construction is at least not rushed but the prospect of such a long period of ongoing works will have many tourism business owners keen to know where and when intervention works will be taking place, at what point will the downtown area be considered safe from future deluge and why will these works take so long in a city that represents 40% of the Algarve’s tourist income and can ill afford to become known as 'the city that floods' should there be a repeat of the November 1st rain last year.
