the essential
A major landslide occurred at the start of rue Gardès at the end of December. The city has closed the road and will take precautionary measures.
The hole is impressive. Sheer, it is flush with the parapet and the road. Above all, we can see beautiful cracks in the wall, which prove the instability of the ground. At the next collapse of the banks, if nothing is done, the road will fall below, on the ruins of the old Gardès mill, which housed the Orkis, a nightclub emblematic of Albigensian nights in the 80s.
On Sunday, local residents noted the damage and took photos. Their houses located on the side of the road are only a few meters from the embankment. “After the road, there are the houses,” confided one of them worriedly.
The sector has been under surveillance since an initial collapse in November. “At this location, there are no trees to retain the earth. And the land is not cleaned, it has been abandoned for a long time,” noted a local resident.
The collapse of the banks took place during the night of December 29 to 30. “As a safety measure, road traffic has been prohibited for around fifty meters. The street is closed to traffic. Residents have all been alerted, by door to door.
The closure of the street requires local residents and workers at the Gillet foundry to take a detour. The street is indeed one way. For the operation of the foundry, no problem, large trucks have not passed through the street for a long time. “They go from behind. We make them turn around in the field,” explains Nicolas Pomarède, the director.
The situation should not continue. “Protective measures are currently being studied in order to stabilize the situation as quickly as possible. An intervention will be carried out in the coming days,” underlines the city.
This sector was the subject of a diagnosis around fifteen years ago. According to the city, the section concerned had not been identified as at risk. A little further away, in the 2000s, a “huge landslide” took place right opposite the foundry. The city then had to have the banks reinforced.
The community wants to go further than precautionary measures and plans to strengthen this sector more sustainably. “A specialized design office has been commissioned to define the technical solution to be implemented. Consolidation work could thus be considered this summer,” assures the city.
Seven sectors listed
The last major bank collapses in Albi took place in 2021 after several days of rain. The Renaudié and Rue du Capitaine Julia sectors were affected. In the city, seven sectors have been listed as posing problems: rue Comté Chardonnet, route de Cordes (notably rue du Captain Julia), rue du Tendat, impasse Croix-de-Clary, rue de Gardès, the rue Fragonnard and rue Gaspard Monges.
