In the autumn Beacon I wrote about the 2007 floods, pointing out that the Civic Society were sceptical about the shelved Environment Agency (EA) flood wall plans.  I also suggested that while the EA were refusing to fund any defences for Pickering, there were a number of cost-effective solutions that should be looked at. The society subsequently   received some quite vitriolic criticism in the press.  Both before and since the June 2007 event, rather than ‘sitting on our hands’ as we were accused of at the time, a number of members have invested  considerable time and effort studying many aspects of flooding and its alleviation. Following a close call on January 22nd, when the town was only a day’s rainfall away from serious flooding again, it seems like an appropriate time to explain some of our findings.

          You will probably be aware of the problems recently experienced by Malton and Norton, where, despite the flood walls holding the river water at bay, some quite serious flooding occurred. This was due to ground water (natural springs and high water table) and surface water flooding on the other side of the walls. This was despite several permanent and temporary pumps working flat out for days. Similar problems were only one of the worries the society had about flood walls for Pickering, another being the effect on water levels above and below the walls due to the restricted flow. i.e. Flooding properties previously unaffected. Two  important factors have remained conspicuously unreported of late. Firstly, that due to land and building costs more than  doubling since the walls were proposed, the £6.7m will inevitably be well over £10m by now. Secondly, that the walls would have been overtopped by the 2007 floods if built as planned. The highest water level was above the proposed wall height. Don’t be too surprised – the Pitt review into the nationwide floods of  summer ‘07 reports that 50% of the country’s flood walls were overtopped.

          My previous article asked if anyone was looking into a series of simple dams upstream that could hold back some of the water long enough to prevent flooding in the town.  Nobody appeared to be doing the looking, so we did. We envisage  simple, low, and therefore relatively cheap dams that would only fill during flood conditions, then empty gradually over a period of hours, thus being inconspicuous and completely empty at all other times.  It’s still early days, but our investigations so far have exceeded our expectations on how cost-effective such a solution could be. Nothing is ever easy, so there would inevitably be problems to overcome.  Dams would be much more effective in the main valley of Newtondale, rather than smaller tributary valleys, but then the integrity of the railway embankment would have to be protected from water damage. We have already been talking with interested parties and will keep working hard to get something more tangible than ‘hot air and column inches’ to   provide cost-effective flood protection for Pickering and other vulnerable villages in Ryedale.

          In common with most societies and organisations nationwide, we are struggling for active members, so if you are interested in contributing to the work outlined above, we would welcome you with open arms. Conversely, if you have any serious disagreements with any of the above, we’ll willingly listen to suitably considered arguments and opinions.

 Mike Potter.