'It's unreal,' Sudbury homeowners say about eroding backyards

Charlene Aikia points to a break in the ground near a four metre drop on her property in Sudbury, Ont. 

With enough pressure, she says the section of grass will wash down and join the other three quarters of her backyard that have caved into the woods by Junction Creek over the past five years. 

"It's just a shame," Aikia said. 

"We used to have a trampoline and a pool back there. Not a big pool, but still. There's a lot of our rights, as homeowners and as children, that were taken away from us."

Aikia is one of several residents living on Melbourne Street in the neighbourhood of New Sudbury, whose property is eroding. ​

In their backyards, a wooden fence lies in the dirt, where the ground used to be level. 

A volleyball has also been left abandoned.

'Definitely aren't expecting to have a golf course back there'

"We don't go down there to get them because it's not safe," resident Stephanie Liba said, adding that her children cannot use the backyard anymore.

"Why should my kids have to play in the front yard," Liba said.

"It's unreal ... They should have a backyard that they can play in."

Liba and her neighbours are calling on the city to help bring back some of the property that they lost so their children can play in their backyards again. 

"We definitely aren't expecting to have a golf course back there," said resident Jeff Hawke.

"But we do expect to be able to have the problem stopped so it doesn't continue to get worse."

The accelerated erosion is due to extra fill that was added to the properties by the subdivision's contractor, according to Coun. Al Sizer. 

He is advocating on behalf of the residents to find a solution.

'No concern for the building settling and sliding down'

"It's a slow process and we have started that process," Sizer said.

"I really am hopeful that we can help these people out and come to some sort of fair conclusion for them."

Soil condition tests show that the extent of erosion is close to as far as it is going to go at this point, according to the city's general manager of growth and infrastructure Tony Cecutti.

"There's no concern for the building settling and sliding down the hill or anything like that," Cecutti said.

"We're going to continue to work with the owners, as best we can, until we've agreed between ourselves and the owners on what the mitigation strategies are, and after we've done that we can start a conversation in terms of what the city's commitments might be."

The city will continue to monitor the backyards until staff are satisfied that the properties will be safe in the long-term, according to Cecutti. 

"We know we will never get the yards back to where the development was originally laid out," Hawke said.

"But we would like to be able to move our sheds back to where they were and not worry about them falling down, and we would really like to build fences again."