THE graphs on these pages clearly show how alarm bells should have been ringing loudly in the Coliban Water board room at least four years ago.

In 2002, the total amount of water available for Bendigo urban use dropped below the critical 40 per cent for the second time in two years and the reservoirs in the Coliban storage system have failed to recover since that year.

Compare that with
Melbourne, where the alarm bells rang last year when the 40 per cent mark was reached for the first time since 1984.

The state government immediately moved to take action, proposing a range of measures costing billions of dollars. In Bendigo, the authorities did not move with the same speed to acknowledge the seriousness of the situation.

Since Bendigo’s storages dropped below 40 per cent, demand has grown rapidly, with 4000 new houses being built in the urban areas.

It was not until the Bendigo Weekly’s highly public and ultimately successful campaign in 2006 that Coliban Water was eventually directed by the state government to pursue the Waranga to Eppalock pipeline project to bring water to the city.

The pipeline is yet to be started.

In July 2000, soaking rain had a welcome effect on central Victoria’s water supplies with the three main catchments supplying Bendigo, Castlemaine and Kyneton recording the largest weekly inflow of the previous four years.

The total Coliban system was at 57.3 per cent and rising – the largest increase since 1996. Within a short time the three main storages were full.

Coliban Water CEO Geoff Michell said at the time: "Providing we continue to manage our water resources carefully our newly filled storages should get us through several average
summers without too much trouble at all."

By November 2000 a lot of water had also flowed into Lake Eppalock and the Coliban system was virtually at full capacity.

Just two years later it was below the critical 40 per cent mark, and it has been all down hill from there.