Flooding to ‘become more common’ in Buckinghamshire

After flooding in several parts of the county this week, Thomas Broom, Buckinghamshire Council’s cabinet member for climate change and the environment said wet weather could become more frequent in the future.

He told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “In terms of climate change, this is the reality. Everybody knows it’s coming. This is it.

“We know that the first thing we are going to experience is drastically higher levels of rainfall and that is likely to continue.”

Paul Jennings, the chairman of the River Chess Association, who has worked extensively on flooding, told the LDRS that the county had seen three especially wet winters since 2019.

He said: “This one looks as if it could be another one. It has started off extremely wet. So, it looks like we are going to have more of these events, and we need to be better prepared for it.

“It means we need to look at our infrastructure. Where we have bottlenecks, we need to de-bottleneck them and make sure that water can flow freely.”

He said that potential solutions could be to consider using ‘alternative channels’ and finding land for ‘active floodplains’ where runoff can be held without overflowing into homes and roads until heavy rain stops.

Cllr Broom explained that the council was currently trying to mitigate flooding from rivers, while it was also putting pressure on water companies to maintain their infrastructure to stop groundwater entering the sewer system.

He said: “It is not like groundwater is getting above surface level, but what is happening is it is getting high enough to infiltrate sewers to create a pressure that is then causing sewage leaks.

“That should not be happening. It is a problem of maintenance. Thames Water is particularly bad on this.”

Lane End is one of the areas of Bucks affected by a sewage leak this week, with effluent reported to have flowed into people’s homes.

A resident of the village told the LDRS on Thursday: “The area concerned is on a slope. It is running down the pathway, running down the hill.”

The sewage leak, said to be affecting properties in Slayter Road and Simmons Way, has been reported to Thames Water, but was ongoing at the time of publication.

Cllr Broom said the county had seen an ‘unprecedented’ amount of rainfall over the last couple of years.

The cabinet member explained that this had impacted roads, rivers and groundwater, despite levels being low at the moment.

He said: “Because of the unprecedented nature of it, there are areas of the county, which have always been susceptible to groundwater flooding like Chalfont St Peter.

“Whereas it would have flooded once every 20 years previously, that water level is getting high enough to flood multiple times a year.”

Cllr Broom said the council was leading a ‘groundbreaking’ project to predict and mitigate groundwater flooding and to notify people which areas would be affected in the future.

He added that his colleague, the cabinet member for transport Steven Broadbent, had been ‘working flat out’ this week to deal with flooding on the county’s roads.

The cabinet encouraged members of the public to go to the council’s website to report and get advice on different types of flooding.

He said: “The most important thing for people is that they get the help they need as quickly as possible. In some cases that will be us at Bucks Council. In some cases that will be other organisations, but everything is listed on our website.”

Buckinghamshire Council said on Thursday: “Following further rainfall overnight, please take care when heading out this morning.

“Avoid low-lying roads, be mindful of fallen branches, trees and other debris, and slow down to give yourself more time to react should need to.”

Flooding from a main river or reservoir can be reported to the Environment Agency on 0345 988 1188. Flooding on roads can be reported to the council on 01296 382 416 or out of office hours on 01296 486 630. For more information, visit: shorturl.at/0WXYt