Flooding rivers
It was reported on the news this morning that flood defence spending on the Thames will by four times the spend on all the rivers in Yorkshire combined.
Fair?
Put another way......according to the Huffington Post, flood defence spending per person of the local population will be 5 times higher in the south east than in the north of the country.
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Decades ago a certain politician whose background was in printing was the minister for the environment. At the time the thames was managed by the Thames Conservancy in respect of water management, not flood defence as it was managed. The Thames was divided into sections, or reaches within which are weirs, locks and flood meadows, with a limit of 7 hours per 24 to release river water through Teddington into the tide stream in order to not fill Londinium with water, less so if the Thames barrier was up to stop the sea coming in.
The said politician owns a large estate in the Henley in the Thames area, as it became last winter. As Staines became Staines in the Thames. The olympic rowing centre at Dorney Reach was the flood relief channel to prevent Bray in the Thames, where large numbers of 'celebrities' resided and got annoyed when the river burst its banks.
When at the DoE said politician over ruled the objections to build the then largest housing development in europe on the flood meadows around Lower Earley. It took over 30 years for the politician to be flooded out of house and home, but what goes around comes around
It was always going to happen given the lack of edumacation where river beds were built on, roads created, cress beds built on, (watercress grows in flowing water, bit of a clue), records not digitised etc If my aged mother was still in Marlow last 2 winters she would have been flooded out, first time in living memory that area was flooded.
So, are defences or water management the solution?
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From what I've read, The South of England is slowly sinking into the sea as the UK rises out of the sea in the north.
Flooding will increase in the south and eventually London will be completely under water. ---------------- SOON
and we all know what SOON means, don't we.
So is it cost effective to be spending all that money on flood defenses in London ??, -------------------- I'm sure King Canute would answer that question in the affirmative.
Cheers...................K
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I'll be back soon - am just off to buy a boat!.
It might be a good thing if the Thames overtopped it banks; think of all the London properties alongside that would have an instant solution to rat problems.
Hopefully such flooding would be kept within the London bowl (roughly the M25 area)between the North downs (to the south) and the little hills in Herts and, Middx.to the North
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I read somewhere that they are using the cost effectiveness of the protection as the basis and we all know that property prices in the South East are completely out of all proportion to the rest of the country so is anyone really surprised by their decision making?
ps Ian, Yorkshire is not alone in being done down too. Those people who were flooded out in Cumbria last Christmas won't be seeing the same concern as say Henley will.
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It's yet to be put to the test, we've not had the severe rainfall we had that year. We've had the usual flooding but nothing as bad. I'm afraid the government can't legislate for rainfall and extremely high tides all happening at once. Tidal rivers are always more vulnerable to extreme events.
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