COLUMN: Protecting the area from future floods

Measures have been taken to help protect residents in local communities in the county from future flooding of their homes.

Nottinghamshire County Council has concluded reports into investigations about four flood incidents, including one in Mansfield.

The reports are produced by the lead local flood authority under section 19 of the Flood and Water Management Act (2010) to investigate what happened during a flood which has damaged five or more properties with internal flooding, and whether relevant risk management authorities (RMAs) did what was required.

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Flooding devastates lives and it is right that we investigate and work with partners and local communities to understand what happened during a flood incident and work together to find out how we can protect them and try to stop their homes flooding in the future.

The reports were discussed by the county council’s transport and highways committee recently. Also discussed is what actions have been taken by the county council and its partners to tackle the issues in the local communities.

Among the recent reports was one related to flooding in Mansfield on June 10, 2016.

Seventeen properties were internally flooded and car parks and roads were affected during this period of intense rainfall which the drainage systems could not cope with and excess water followed natural flow paths and valleys.

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Since the flood, Severn Trent Water is checking the operational effectiveness of the public sewers and the county council is working with partners on a detailed feasibility study to find potential flood mitigation measures and funding streams.

Meanwhile, Nottinghamshire County Council is one of several local authorities in the region which has recently agreed to a 1.99 per cent increase in contribution to the Local Levy Fund – a proposal made by the Trent regional flood and coastal committee.

Nottinghamshire County Council has also been successful in bidding for Local Levy funding to aid our flood alleviation schemes. Nottinghamshire County Council makes a capital allocation of around £600,000 each year for flood risk management and also spends around £1.3m a year on land drainage, gully emptying and drainage repairs.

The county council also has a flood risk management strategy and has worked extensively with partners and with local communities on future flood risk management and ways that we can work with communities and partner agencies to improve flood risk resilience.