Operation of the Concealed Flood Barrier is engineered on the principles of buoyancy making it the ultimate fail safe flood barrier, and often specified over actuated options, for emergency management.
An automatic flood barrier has been installed for a new residential development in Melbourne.
The luxury building comprises of ten apartments, over four levels, with a below ground level basement car stacker.
AWMA were engaged by a Melbourne construction company to design, manufacture and install a flood barrier that complies with new specifications to meet an increased flood level, for Melbourne properties in flood prone areas.
The Concealed Flood Barrier was selected due to its ease of operation (with no mechanical or human intervention), hidden profile (concealed within building architecture) and design flexibility (to meet client requirements).
The Concealed Flood Barrier is permanently situated below ground level at the isolation point, in this case across the width of the driveway, between retaining walls, parallel to the footpath. Under normal conditions, the barrier is contained within a cassette that sits below the driveway with a capping plate on top of the barrier, flush at ground level. The capping plate can be designed to accommodate heel safe pedestrian traffic through to heavy vehicle loadings on high use roads (meeting Australian Standards for vehicular traffic AS1170.1). The capping plate may be fabricated from a range of materials allowing the only visible part of the barrier to be integrated with the surrounding surface finishes.
The flood barrier will not engage during normal rain events, within a predetermined level. As flood levels increase, water flows into the cassette through an automatically controlled drain system causing the barrier, which has a displacement less than that of water, to fully rise, creating a barrier to any floodwater starting to pool above ground level. No external power or human intervention is required for this flood protection barrier to activate. Once water levels drop, the water pressure reduces, which in turn causes the barrier to return to a closed position inside the below ground cassette. This barrier is suitable for access areas up to 15m wide and 1.5 meters high as standard, other sizes may be engineered as required.
