LEWES FLOODING - NEW INVESTIGATIONS

Lewes is one of 15 towns and cities across England that will benefit from an investigation into urban drainage flooding.

The 1.7 million of studies, announced by the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) will pinpoint areas at risk, identify the causes and consider the best ways of managing urban drainage in a fully integrated manner to reduce future flooding.

Lewes has a history of flooding and although in recent years there have been several schemes constructed to reduce the potential for flooding, parts of the town continue to experience problems due to local drainage inadequacies. In addition, there are significant development proposals for Lewes.

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The study will consider the risk of flooding from many sources including highways, land drainage, sewerage and the river.

As the sources of potential flooding are varied there are different organisations that need to be involved in finding solutions. The study will be carried out by Black & Veatch on behalf of Lewes Integrated Urban Drainage Steering Group which comprises The Environment Agency, Southern Water, East Sussex County Council and Lewes District Council.

The aim of the pilot study is to identify possible solutions to the flooding problems and produce a joint action plan of preventative works and contingency plans in Lewes to deal with them in a cost effective and sustainable way.

Andrew Gilham, Environment Agency Flood Risk Manager for Sussex said: 'Since the floods of 2000, we have done a lot of work to investigate ways of reducing flood risk from the River Ouse in Lewes. However, urban flooding is complex as it often comes from a variety of sources and often involves a number of different organisations. We are looking forward to working with the other partners to address this issue in Lewes.'

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Ian Kedge, Head of Environment and Health at Lewes District Council said: 'This is an excellent opportunity to consider all the aspects of flooding in Lewes town in addition to the problems of flooding from the river. The joint working of the four steering group partners and the consultant engineers will enable us to determine priorities and hopefully solutions to some long standing problems.'

Councillor Matthew Lock, Lead Cabinet Member for Transport and Environment at East Sussex County Council said: 'The partners in this project have worked hard to improve the drainage system in Lewes in recent years. This study will help us improve upon this further. I am pleased that we are actively identifying potential risks and are developing plans to deal with them.'