The low lands of Somerset are naturally prone to flooding, and there is continual work to be done to reduce the risk of inconvenience, expense and even tragedy of flooding. Climate change brought on by our persistent use of fossil fuels, our appetite for meat and other oil fashioned human habits will make the flooding worse in years to come, partly through more intense rainfall, partly through sea level rise, so we must lobby politicians and institutions to take serious action.
The Somerset Rivers Authority is the body that has responsibility for coordinating flood prevention, drawing together Somerset Council, the Axe Brue and Parrett Internal Drainage Boards, (IDBs), Environment Agency, Natural England, Wessex Regional Flood & Coastal Committee and Wessex Water.
Flood prevention goes far beyond the simple work of maintaining flood barriers around the river. Let us look at the solutions holistically, starting at the highest ground and moving downstream to the sea.
First, all hilltops around the catchment area of all the rivers in Somerset should be afforested, except only a few sites of special scientific or archaeological interest. Water runoff from wooded hilltop areas is up to 60% less than grassy areas, because tree root systems allow water to trickle down into the soil.
Reimagining the Levels is a voluntary organisation that has already done excellent work in planting thousands of trees in Somerset, 120,000 since 2020, and 4 miles of hedgerows, but it is wrong to rely solely on voluntary work to protect against flooding, especially when there are so many young people who are suffering badly from unemployment. Local Government should be funded to provide a major and urgent programme of tree planting on all available upland areas, sensitively done with proper compensation for land owners.
Second, some fields should be officially designated as “polders”, areas where water can officially be diverted into when a large amount of water is flowing downstream. Landowners and farmers will be compensated for providing this service.
Third, flood banks designed to prevent flooding from rivers need to be set further back from the river. This provides a larger potential space for the river to expand into, and also provides a more generous area in which the specialist riverbank flora and fauna can operate.
Fourth, river channels do need to be deepened by dredging. This is contentious because dredging disturbs the ecological balance of the river bed, and it needs to be done carefully. Conversations need to be set up between ecologists and dredgers.
Fifth, pinch points and bottlenecks in the course of the river need to be kept clear of siltation and obstructions such as fallen trees, and in times of threatened flooding, and experimental method should be tried where boat owners fix their station on the river by warps upstream of the pinch point and turn on their power to increase the speed of the current through the bottleneck.
Sixth, we need to consider copying the Bridgewater Barrier at the mouth of the Brue at Highbridge, to keep tidal surges out of the river. Surges occur when high spring tides.
All of these changes need active discussion and sensitive balancing and agreement from both sides. Basically, farmers want low water tables, and environmentalists seek high water tables to maintain wetlands and peat. Politicians need to work hard to get agreements on where these levels should be set, and engineers need to find optimum solutions to the competing demands.
The solution to flooding is difficult and costly, but people who occupy and use the land must gain motivation from the fact that waiting in the wings lie the do-nothing brigade, the Corporal Fraziers who reckon we are all doomed and that The Levels must be left to sink under the sea.