Floods...

[biffvernon]

Inside Fell Foot Tea Room today:

 

[Penners]

I simply cannot imagine how you begin to recover from something like that. A disaster if it's your business; a heartbreak if it's your home.

 

[judrop]

Yes indeed. But there again, in the grand scheme of things, Cumbria and Galloway must be about the least concreted parts of the realm.

This is obviously so, however the river authorities can change an area of a river which has been badly affected by flooding,( perhaps just historically), and this will in effect "move the problem on", It continues to flood , but somewhere else!

Drains , especially flood water drains, are not cleaned out anything like as often they need to be, rivers are no longer dredged, all this contributes to these devastating, recurrent ,floods.

Local authorities do not want to spend money on these things, to prevent "possible" flooding,a bad state of affairs.

I can remember when the drains were cleaned out on a regular basis, AND seeing the rivers being dredged!

I cant imagine we had MORE money in those days ?

 

[biffvernon]

I don't have much local knowledge of Cumbria, but in my neck of the woods the drainage system is very well maintained - probably better than ever historically - and a great deal of further investment is ongoing. I think one has to be careful of one's facts before blaming the Environment Agency for damage resulting from the highest rainfall total in 24 hours ever recored in Britain.

The problem for the future is that climate models suggest that these formerly rare events will become more common as the planet warms. What, from the historic record, may appear as a once in a thousand year event will prove to be commonplace.

 

[Moneypit]

rivers are no longer dredged,

from the Independent on Sunday website;-
"(Local residents claimed the floods, the second in Cockermouth in four years, were caused by the designation of the twin rivers to be of special scientific interest by the EU, in order to protect salmon spawning grounds.

Eric Nicholson, a Cumbria county councillor, said: "That allowed English Nature to forbid the removal of gravel, which is all right in open country, but is no good near town centres. They said, let the rivers find their own course. Well, it found its own course – right down the main street."

However Phil Rothwell, the Environment Agency's head of flooding strategy, said that no amount of dredging would have prevented the flooding. Cockermouth's flood defences had been upgraded since the 2005 floods, but these were overpowered by the sheer amount of water. "These were exceptional circumstances, although with climate change these exceptions may become the norm." )"


There is also talk of fighting against new nuclear build in West Cumbria on behalf of the resident Natterjack Toad population. Tough choices!

 

[biffvernon]

However Phil Rothwell, the Environment Agency's head of flooding strategy, said that no amount of dredging would have prevented the flooding. Cockermouth's flood defences had been upgraded since the 2005 floods, but these were overpowered by the sheer amount of water. "These were exceptional circumstances, although with climate change these exceptions may become the norm." )"

There is also talk of fighting against new nuclear build in West Cumbria on behalf of the resident Natterjack Toad population. Tough choices!

Yeah. Like wot I said, and no brainer.

 

[Penners]

I can remember when the drains were cleaned out on a regular basis, AND seeing the rivers being dredged!

That may be, but what you probably can't remember is over 350mm of rain falling in the space of 36 hours. It's been described as a "one in 1000 years event". That may be a melodramatic description, but there's no doubt that the amount of water that descended on those unfortunate areas is unprecedented.

No Government could justify spending the amount of money necessary to protect communities against that kind of deluge.

There's a parallel situation with snowfall. Most winters in most parts of the UK are mild, and snow doesn't present a major problem. Occasionally, however, we get two or three days of more substantial snow, and the country grinds to a halt.

"Why can't we be more like the Scandinavians?", cries the Press. "They get a huge depth of snow every year, and they deal with it quickly and efficiently."

Yes, and because they know that they'll get that snow every year, they can justify the expenditure on equipment and protective measures to deal with it.

 

[judrop]

I can remember when the drains were cleaned out on a regular basis, AND seeing the rivers being dredged!

That may be, but what you probably can't remember is over 350mm of rain falling in the space of 36 hours. It's been described as a "one in 1000 years event".

Being well over 1000 years old Penners I CAN infact remember it ! :lol: :lol: :lol: !
To be serious,the volume of rain may have been the main factor in the current circumstances, my point was that we GENERALLY do far too little to be pro active regarding flooding, moving problems up or down stream is just short sighted, it seems to me perfectly sensible to deepen the channels in appropriate areas, but far more importantly to have an on going policy and commitment to inspection and refurbishment of river banks and associated areas, simple good housekeeping, will help to ease the problem.
Just like Sweden being prepared for the snow, we now need to be prepared for the rain and flooding, whatever our personal belief as to the cause of it, our weather is changing, and that, I for one ,feel is what we should be looking to, the alternative is headless chicken land !
We will not solve this problem here , and I can see it becoming one of the topics that arouse people to anger, so I now bow out of this conversation.

 

[Flyfisher]

Funny things, statistics. A 1-in-1000 years event can, of course, occur tomorrow and again the following week. But the average accuracy, or otherwise, is scant comfort to the poor people flooded out today.

The historical practice of building settlements near rivers, for good reasons, has left us with a tricky legacy in the context of rising sea-levels. I wonder how many major cities around the world are not built on a river? And economics inevitably rears its ugly head. It's one thing to build a Thames Barrier that can protect a city of 10m people and many others further upstream, but it's quite another to spend similar amounts of money protecting a small town or an eroding coastline.

I do wonder about some house builders though and how they get permission to build on water meadows that have flooded regularly for hundres of years. Our house is near a river but it is on a high point, just beyond the Environment Agency flood risk map for the village. Furthermore, it's the other side of the river that regularly floods, where it is so flat the water would probably have to spread out for tens of miles before it would back-up to our house. So why were the builders more sensible 450 years ago than they seem to be today, given that there are many new houses within the village inside the EA flood risk area? Perhaps because there weren't any Buildit, Floggit & Run building firms back then?

 

[judrop]

I know I said I wouldnt but here I am again ! Womans prerogative !
Hear hear! Flyfisher . Our garden backs on to the Trent and we are in a flood warning area, it has not flooded, in living memory at least, and possibly not at all in 400 years, due to the work carried out hundreds of years ago, to ensure that when the river rises high enough to break the bank, it then flows onto the floodland on the opposite bank, amazing !
Developers building on flood planes( there seem to be an increasing number of them ) display an incredible head in sand attitude, sadly it is not they who suffer the consequences of their actions, why do planners allow it ? FIN Ju XX

 

[Penners]

I can see it becoming one of the topics that arouse people to anger, so I now bow out of this conversation.

Good heavens - what gave you that idea? It's just a lively discussion. I'm not aware of anyone getting even tetchy, let alone aroused to anger!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Harrumph speak for yourself!! I'm FUMING. :twisted: :twisted: :twisted: :wink:

 

[Penners]

I don't believe that a cultured lady such as yourself, ma'am, would know how to fume.

 

[JoceAndChris]

:lol:

No, indeed not. I have never raised my voice in my life. :wink:

 

[biffvernon]

Flood plains flood. There's a clue in the name. However, the advantages of living by a river have often, for thousands of years, out-weighed the disadvantage of flooding especially if there's a good chance of not getting flooded for several decades. Even regular floods aren't always a deterrent. Take the pub by the river in the middle of York. The ground floor gets flooded most winters but they just move to the upper floor bar and hose out the lower floor when the river goes back to its bed. The inconvenience is outweighed by the profits of having a waterside bar with tables on the quayside.

Despite this, it is getting increasingly difficult to get planning permission for development in areas that the Environment Agency has deemed to be 'at risk'. People have always wanted to live on flood plains and I doubt if builders of old were 'more sensible'. In Louth 10 houses were washed away in 1920. Maybe there's been a bit of natural selection of period properties over the centuries.

The notion of the one in 1000 years event is curious. We only have rainfall and river gauge data going back decades, not millenia. The 1 in 1000 statistic is derived from a pretty standard bit of mathematics that accesses the probability of extreme event beyond the range of the available data. Importantly, this is based on historic data and assumes that the future will be like the past. Not a valid approach when faced with climate change.

How much we spend on flood defences or what period properties we abandon as undefendable are going to be political and economic judgements that we will have to confront more frequently in the future.

 

[Jon Maine]

We know of properties flooded in the past where a hose down sweep out and a few new dry furnishings were the solution. Whilst I do understand that the floods in question constitute more than a sweep out in most cases is one of the problems that modern living has become so sanitised that the simple sweep out without a large insurance claim is no longer an option?

We are fortunately on a hillside 14 metres or so above the base of the valley which at 14 metres up is very wide so god help us if it reaches us, the base of the valley does have houses which can flood next to the river but we are very unlikely to flood.

Lets say I had one of those houses, if it had all of its sockets a metre up the wall, above the flood level solid stone floors, lime plaster which should wick moisture out the wall once the water has subsided would we have a serious problem? I ask the question because it feels as if no should be the answer.

We have even worked on new houses built on stilts or raised banks a couple of metres up to avoid this issue.

This however does not detract from my sympathy for all of those effected.

 

[DaveBrigg]

I think the problem is not so much the floodwater, it's what is floating around in the water. When it happened around here a couple of years ago the sewers overflowed, while the water also picked up the usual debris of half-filled oil drums, fuel from submerged cars, drowned rats etc. I still think that a stone floored house could be hosed down, disinfected and left for a while, but for those with voids under the floorboards, the thought of having a couple of Richard III's beneath your livng room must have been off-putting.

 

[Jon Maine]

I agree, but surely expectations must change and precautions must be taken.

Houses on hill may become valuable.......

 

[jocelyn plummer]

The River Ray flooded my childhood village every year, the houses with riverside gardens are still standing, the gardens are still lovely, but I wonder how the academics who have turned the village into a dormitory to Oxford get on with their cutting edge refurbishments and their insurance.

The best years were 1957 and 1963 when the whole lot, together with Christchurch Meadows froze over for weeks on end.

 

[Feltwell]

How times change. Whilst at University, I wanted to work on flood & coastal defence schemes when I left. However, at the time (only 1991) the National Rivers Authority were cutting back and laying off experienced engineers - a new graduate had no chance. I got accepted at British Waterways to work on canal schemes, but they too then shut their graduate intake.

A few years on and I bet experienced engineers are in demand now.