‘People are so worried when it rains’
As Northampton succumbs to flooding once again, a councillor says the unitary council, as lead flood authority needs to get on the front foot
By Sarah Ward
Residents living in areas of Northampton prone to flooding are ‘petrified’ when the rain comes down, says a councillor, who wants the local authority to be more proactive.
The county’s fire service dealt with more than 80 incidents across the county over the weekend, with busy roads leading into Northampton flooded with surface water and businesses having to close and events cancelled.
Hema Patel, owner of the Ark, a boat cafe on the River Nene close to Bedford Road, which was submerged under water on Sunday, said the green space close to where her boat is moored ‘now looks like a lake’. She said she had already noticed how high the river levels are for September.
The rain continued throughout yesterday and overnight, with two flood warnings issued in the early evening- for the Dallington Brook and Brampton Brook of Northampton and the area of Bozeat, Grendon and Yardley Hastings in the North of the county. A third flood warning was issued at around midnight by the Environment Agency for the Cogenhoe Mill caravan site and nearby areas close to the Wootton Brook including Collingtree, Merefield and Shelfleys.
The Far Cotton area of Northampton often suffers when there is heavy rainfall, with a major flooding incident in 2018 with many homes flooded and people rescued from their properties by boat.
Cllr Emma Roberts, who represents the ward, said the West unitary council, which is the lead local flood authority and has a duty to have a flood risk strategy, has to do more proactive work.
She said: “The problem is that people are so worried when it rains. In St Leonards Road they are petrified. They are out clearing the drains themselves.
“There is nowhere for them to go to get help and advice except web links. If I rang the council and said ‘where can we get sandbags? I would be told there is nowhere.’
“The biggest issue for me is that it is all reactive. It is not proactive.”
She was complimentary about the out of hours highways team who she says were very busy over the weekend.
After the 2018 floods, there was a flood investigation report, which came up with a series of recommendations for the local flood authority and the Environment Agency, which included coming up with a community flood plan, recruiting volunteer flood wardens and assessing the viability of schemes to reduce the flood risk.
Cllr Roberts said: “None of these actions as far as I can see have been acted upon.”
She says that with the move to unitary in 2021, action on the recommendations had been lost. She also said the issue of flooding had not been properly discussed in the council chamber, with only the odd line in a council report.
Flooding has become more frequent in Northampton in recent years, with a significant issue at Billing Aquadrome where almost 2,000 residents live in temporary homes on the holiday site, which was built on the floodplain. When the reservoir overflows, the sluice gates are opened and the waters rush into the site. All residents have to be evacuated before the gates can open and in the past have been evacuated in the early hours of the morning to the sounds of air raid like sirens. Many have nowhere else to go when their home becomes submerged.
In February after the latest incident at Billing, then leader of the council Jonathan Nunn, said there would be a task force set up to consider the issues.
NN Journal put some questions to the authority yesterday asking about the task force promised, but was told that due to the ‘live response’ it was dealing with, it could not answer the question.
A spokesperson said:
“The Council is currently working with its partners as part of the Local Resilience Forum including police and fire to respond to the ongoing weather situation and supporting with incidents of localised flooding over the weekend. With heavy rainfall expected to continue throughout today we are closely monitoring the situation to ensure we can support residents through this changing situation.
“We would urge all residents to take extra care, keep an eye on the Police, fire service and our social media feeds for updates and visit the flooding advice pages on our website for further information and support.”
Last month the Environment Agency set up its own nationwide taskforce to ‘turbo charge’ the delivery of flood defences and put a focus on asset maintenance.
Northamptonshire North is part of the Anglia North flood committee, along with parts of Rutland and Lincolnshire.
The committee has a say on flood works programmes, but as we reported back in January, a small amount of overall money spent comes to Northants.
More from us on this issue
Special report: Region's flood risk committee calls for change
“These sort of events were supposed to be one in fifty years. It has barely been four years since the last one. So we have got to start thinking on those terms - that this is going to be the norm as we get drier summers and wetter autumns and winters. I think we have to completely reappraise how we look at the main rivers.”
Is it time for the Billing Aquadrome floods to be discussed in the council chamber?
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I don't think the council has a front foot!
Everything they do is reactive.
It's the climate crisis! For every 1°C we increase the temperature of the climate we see 7% more moisture in the atmosphere. This causes more intense rain and leads to a greater number of flooding events. Blocked drains don't help, but even if they were properly maintained they wouldn't be able to cope with a month's worth of rain in 12 hours. But don't worry, we've got a plan: we're going to delay doing anything until it's too late, then try to do something.