The hole formed on July 6 after the reopening of a key bridge over the Nepean river,cutting off surrounding Cobbitty residents from a direct path to schools and workplaces and leaving them with a 45-minute detour to get to the other side.
Damage caused by flood waters which demolished part of the Cobbitty bridge,severing an arterial road between Cobbitty and Camden.Dean Sewell
Unlike previous times the bridge has closed,the cause isn’t floodwater obscuring the bridge itself,but a landslide after the road reopened – nearly taking one resident,his child and new car with it.
Wollondilly resident Debbie Zarbalis is frustrated with a lack of transparency about when the bridge will reopen and argues the hole was bound to occur at some point due to a lack of maintenance.
“We have people dodging mammoth potholes on poorly maintained roads and driving an extra hour each day just to get their kids to school,it can’t go on like this,” she said.
Camden council is overseeing the bridge’s reopening in consultation with Wollondilly Shire Council and specialist contractors. A spokesperson from Camden council said that the time and cost of repair is yet to be determined but acknowledged it may be “many months” before the bridge is reopened.
Cobbity General Store owner Debbie Zarbalis believes that she will have to sell her house to pay for the store.Dean Sewell
The councils are also investigating whether providing pedestrian access over the bridge as a stop-gap measure may relieve pressures on the surrounding communities.
For Zarbalis and many other locals,the lack of clarity is not good enough. “While two councils have been wasting time fighting over whose responsibility it is to reopen the bridge,we feel like the forgotten community,” Zarbalis said,adding her preference would be for a temporary military bridge to be installed as previously customary.
For the past 25 years,Zarbalis has been the proud owner of Cobbitty’s General Store,a pillar of the community since its 1940 opening. The no-frills one-stop shop functions as the local post office,cafe,grocer,bottle shop,newsagent and takeaway restaurant for hundreds of surrounding residents.
“When the bridge first closed,trade dropped to 20 per cent,” Zarbalis said. “Thanks to the support of the community who’ve been spreading the word to Camden,we’ve bounced back to 40 per cent,but I am seriously worried about what will happen if this goes on for much longer.”
Cobbitty bridge has been closed after flood damage.Dean Sewell
She argues Camden and Wollondilly Shire council should take more responsibility for the economic hardship the area’s experiencing,and blames overdevelopment and poor infrastructure for the way the increase in floods has ravaged the region.
“If you approve developments in a flood zone you need to be responsible for when the area inevitably floods. They’ve not left anywhere for the water to go,” Zarbalis said.
South-west Sydney has borne the full brunt of La Nina’s wrath. In April,a Cobbitty resident died after becoming trapped in the flood water. Whenever the Nepean river floods,Cobbitty bridge closes and Zarbalis redraws on her home loan to pay the store’s rent. This year’s bout of flooding has pushed her home loan up by $25,000.
“If this keeps happening I will not last. I’ve laid off staff,I had to tell my own daughter she no longer has a job. I’m a strong person,but my mental health at this present moment is not good.
Owner Debbie Zarbalis outside the Cobbitty General Store.Dean Sewell
“I don’t cry in public,and I think I’ve cried more tears in this last month than I have in my whole life. It’s broken all of us who own businesses in the area.
“I have the most amazing customers who are trying their hardest to support Cobbitty,but with petrol and the cost of living the way it is it’s difficult for people to justify adding 45 minutes onto their trip just to support us.”
Zarbalis has been heartened by the way the locals have banded together to support the store,with some residents “who don’t even drink” purchasing cases of wine and others phoning in to order thousands of dollars worth of stock to be donated to others as a show of support.
“This community is full of hard-working people who’ve been through a lot over the past year,we just want some semblance of normal so we can get our lives back in a time when the cost of living is already so unreasonably high,” she said.
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