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St. Paul, Savage Prepare For Spring Flooding As Rivers Rise

ST. PAUL, Minn. (WCCO) – As rivers in Minnesota rise, the cities near those rivers are starting to make noticeable preparations.

In St. Paul, the city closed roads Sunday night. It closed Warner/Shepard Road from Childs Road to Ontario Street, 2nd Street from Kellogg Boulevard to Sibley Street, 4th Street from Willius to Commercial Street, Jackson Street from Warner Road to Kellogg Boulevard, and Sibley Street from Warner Road to Kellogg Boulevard.

 

The city also moved the impound lot up near the State Fairgrounds and is starting to build a flood wall near Lowertown.

Rick Schute, director of emergency management for the City of St. Paul, said the weather the last few weeks has been helping.

"We've had ideal melting conditions with nice warm sunshine like we are having today, and then the cooling off and refreeze at night, which really pumps the breaks for the freezing process," Schute said. "No great rain of concern in the future, we feel we are ready and we want the residents to know that."

Below is the latest update from the National Weather Service for the Mississippi River in St. Paul:

The City of Savage is also preparing. Andy Weldon, Public Works superintendent with the City, says they have been working hard the last couple of weeks to prepare.

"The last three weeks we have been preparing. We've had meetings weekly and now daily. We've got sand on hand at our public works shop, we've got sandbags made up and on reserve," Weldon said. "And we are continually monitoring the river level and reacting accordingly to what's going on in the system."

The city also put plastic and sandbags on the sanitary sewer manhole covers near the Minnesota River. The sandbags and plastic are just precautions since the water has never reached the manhole covers in the last 17 years and the water is not predicted to get that high.

Below is the latest update from the National Weather Service for the Minnesota River in Savage:

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