Floods!

I have nothing to add except sincere sympathy to those affected.

Our town was often flooded until the eighties, a small market town with two small rivers and one large plus a canal . The large river bed was dredged and sunk lower, no floods since apart from the golf course and some parks which are on the banks of the smaller rivers .

Just heard from DD2 the water has gone down there now quite a bit.

This town was flooded a few years a go as a result a dam was built but its only set to last for so long and there are no plans to replace it.

I lived in York for ten years, including the 2000 floods, when there was only one road open out of York.
This is much worse.
The Foss barrier was built to protect houses upstream from the Ouse/ city centre, but they have left it up because of the problems of an electrical fault, thus flooding all those houses which were protected by it.
I used to joke that where we lived on Haxby Road was on the only hill in York, so we would be safe. However I have noticed that even Haxby Road has been closed by the police. 3500 houses been evacuated along the Foss.
Buses rerouted to avoid the area.
I feel so sorry for people who thought that the barrier would protect them.
What was the point of it?

My son and his wife came down here yesterday from their home just outside York and he was on the phone to his boss this morning about the situation with their offices which are right by the river and very likely to be flooded if they haven't been already. Their house is not in a flood area fortunately, but my friend also lives in York, very close to the Foss in Haxby, and I have been unable to get hold of her this morning so i really hope she is okay.

According to the flood maps and the York Press, it's all inside the outer ring road, Greyduster, although some of the photos show Strensall village flooded.
www.yorkpress.co.uk is the site that gets updated.
Foss Islands Road looks bad. An hour ago the Ouse was still rising, but it did not say whether the Foss was. The Foss in Haxby is just like my village here, according to the flood maps.

On Christmas Eve the floods hit West Yorkshire,I live in Shipley where the River Aire burst its banks,and people were being rescued by boat,houses evacuated,and footbridges destroyed,but towns like Skipton and Ilkley were affected ,most people saying they had never experienced the like! I am glad to live at the top of a hill,but so sad for those caught up In it

anniebach DH keeps saying 'they need to dredge the rivers'

We walked along our local river yesterday and it was just full of silt, washing down, but it leaves deposits as it goes.
I did notice they were clearing drains nearby but they don't seem to do that so often.

There used to be a dredger on the Foss. Although it's a river, it looks more like a canal, particularly the bit between the Rowntree factory and the Ouse. Perhaps that was what it was when it was built, to ferry cocoa to the factory.

Hope everyone stays safe. It must be so horrible to go through flooding once, let alone several times.

They have had it so bad up north - luckily my children up there live in the top of a Victorian woolen mill so can watch the action from a safe distance.

Our home has flooded in the past, but at last, after much battling with the authorities, we have been helped by the parish lengthsman who comes regularly to dig out the ditches.

Last winter when Somerset was flooded, one village where we have relatives was saved because the farmers had regularly maintained the ditches.

Essential planned maintenance is what is needed.

Roseq it's very true that farmers have to do their bit. Good on those who maintained the ditches.

But I phoned an ex-neighbour today who is in one of the affected areas and she tells me they are in danger of flooding from surface water. The local landowner (who knows nought about farming) hired a gang of pickets with extra heavy machinery onto his land to harvest vegetables in the autumn and all the field drains have collapsed under the weight. The fields are flooded because of this but the ditches are DRY as there's nothing to take the water off the fields and into the ditches.

Just seen that York hospital switchboard is out of order because of the flooding. Hope 111 is not affected.

There's something terribly wrong about all this; it's happening so often now we're almost getting to accept it as normal.

The way to mitigate this new normal is to plan for proper flood defences and proper maintenance of existing defences and looking after rivers etc. We can't do this if we constantly cut our budgets.

A new flood plain is being created near our home at huge expense. It's needed because permission was given to build on the existing - functioning and effective - flood plain triggering flooding in previously 'safe' areas. I truly don't understand. Our actions cause so much harm.

Lots of factors in play here aren't there. Planning issues - building houses on flood plains, design of buildings etc. Flood prevention - drain clearing budgets etc. The extent to which it makes sense to invest in big engineering projects. (Obviously there must be some kind of guideline for these in terms of benefits from a project.) At the moment, on the radio, the head of EA is talking about the fact that all our existing flood defences (and some of the planning) is based on historical data but that the future is not the past. Our weather is changing and extreme weather events are also increasing.
The government were advised of this in October by the climate change advisory committee that the risk of flooding will increase beyond historical data and that they need a strategy to address this.
However they seem to have shrugged this off. Of course it has implications for their carbon reduction strategy, for spending (which they seek to avoid unless the HS2 is mentioned) and for planning and regulations. This government far from being "the greenest government ever" - as Cameron promised 5 years ago has turned out to be anything but. They don't like regulation (farmers for instance have been let off an obligation to conserve soils) and they are deeply conflicted about planning (they want to control everything centrally but at the same time want to devolve all planning consents - or rather lack of consents, to local communities.)
Their main effort re flooding seems to have been to press the insurance business to spread the risk of flooding onto everyone's home insurance - so we all get to pay for this damage folks. If your home insurance policy goes up then that is why.
Be of good cheer, though, flooded people of the North. When the Thames valley was flooded Cameron promised unlimited funds to help. So contact your MPs and ask when the north is going to get unlimited funds.

www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/09/cameron-government-rejected-flood-risk-warnings-from-climate-advisers?CMP=share_btn_tw

I lived in York for ten years and we had four hundred year events in that time. The problems of increased flooding were known about then. Two hundred year events are possible in ten years, but not four.
There was a photo of the King's Arms with the Ouse nearly up to the top of the ground floor windows. Never seen it quite that high before.
The council were saying that we need to make buildings more flood resilient, concrete floors instead of wooden, and electrical sockets higher up the wall so that they are not vulnerable. The King's Arms did all that in 2000. The ground floor sockets would have to be on the first floor!

Anyway, Cameron's in York today, so I am sure they are grateful, JessM.
He will be able to see for himself the effects of ignoring good advice.
Climate change? What climate change?

In 2010 the EA was told to divert the maintenance budget to high profile flood defences at the same time cutting the budget for new flood defences as well. They have consistently ignored advice. The latest is mitigation for wildlife protection. However not sure if that will run as many wealthy landowners value wildlife conservation.

So how do we answer those people who keep shouting for more and more housing? More building - surely not on flood plains as was extensive under the last Labour government - still means building on land which at present soaks up surface water.

We can't cover all the high ground with housing and all the infrastructure associated with an increasing population.

www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2015/12/28/paying-for-flood-defence-work-is-easy-unless-youre-looking-in-the-petty-cash/

twitter.com/hashtag/yorkfloods?src=hash

I hope this works.

Well, you get all the photos with that link.

The one I hoped to specifically link to was the Star Inn sign.

A comment on yorkradio; if a city floods in the north and a southerner is not there to see it, did it even flood?

What's your answer, then, roseq, get rid of the increasing population? How do you suggest we do that?