A CONTROVERSIAL Environment Agency plan to flood land to create a wildlife habitat at Donna Nook has been approved by East Lindsey District Council.

The land in Marsh Lane in North Somercotes will see the Donna Nook-managed re-alignments scheme remove the existing flood defence and replace it with a newly improved flood defence system.

It will change the use of existing agricultural land and be used to form a new embankment to form new wildlife habitats which will include creation of intertidal habitat, islands and creeks.

The final decision made by East Lindsey District Council was a close one with the vote going six to five for the approval of the Environment Agency plans. (more…)

Residents who live in 12 properties on Cliff Road say their properties are threatened because of cliff erosion. They have submitted a planning application for a protection scheme to East Devon District Council.

The residents have funded the £10,000 application themselves which is for a 240-metre long, 4.5-metre high rock revetment at the base of the cliffs near Pennington Point at the mouth of the River Sid.

The scheme could cost around £900,000 of public money.

Residents say their homes could fall over the cliff face within 15 years if action is not taken soon. (more…)

A GREAT deal of work has been done to try to ensure the efficient management of the local shoreline by a number of organisations representing a whole variety of interests.

The North West England and North Wales Shoreline Management Plan 2 final report has recently been published and which covers the whole of the Sefton coastline.

Formby Parish Council took part in the public consultation phase and submitted a response to the draft recommendations. (more…)

FLOOD defences across the whole of the Maldon district are to be maintained in a new Shoreline Management Plan, protecting thousands of acres.

But farmers and landowners remain concerned for the future.

They feel they have not had enough of a say on the long-term threat of the encroaching sea. (more…)

A large-scale £16m defence scheme designed to protect Selsey from the ravages of the sea was given the go-ahead by Chichester district councillors in a unanimous vote.

The ambitious Environment Agency (EA) project – the Medmerry managed realignment scheme – will also help create wildlife habitats being lost elsewhere in the Solent, the southern area development control committee was told.

The project aims to protect 348 properties from flooding over the next 100 years. (more…)

A controversial plan to deliberately breach a Wells flood bank has been discarded by environmental planners in response to a host of objections from landowners and townspeople.

The Environment Agency (EA) is finalising a draft shoreline management plan (SMP) designed to help the North Norfolk coast adapt to rising sea levels during the next century.

One of the ideas put forward was a £4.2m scheme to reconstruct Wells’ eastern defences further inland, allowing land behind the existing east bank to flood. (more…)

‘HOLD the line at Hengistbury Head – or increase the risk of a flooding disaster’.

These men are fighting a proposed change in the coastal protection plan.

They say in time it could lead to the flooding of Christchurch Harbour, and the erosion of Hengistbury Head. (more…)

It is the quintessential coastal holiday destination, complete with a historic harbour popular with yacht owners and idyllic countryside that offers visitors a glimpse of a more traditional, genteel way of life.

Such is the charm of Southwold, on the Suffolk coast, that Gordon Brown and his wife Sarah took their two sons on a family holiday there and each summer the town attracts thousands of music fans who come to enjoy the Latitude Festival.

But now large areas of the popular beauty spot are to be lost under government plans to abandon the flood defences that have protected the town and its surrounding countryside from the sea for more than 400 years. (more…)

The infrastructure network in the UK, including power stations, water plants, and transport systems is still far too vulnerable to flooding events according to a report, Flooding: Engineering Resilience, by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).

In a section concentrating on the East of England, it also comments that:

“No other area of the UK is in such real and immediate danger from flooding as the East of England. It’s at risk from all sides: coastal erosion and flooding, tidal surges, river flooding and overflowing drains in towns and cities.

“In November 2007 Great Yarmouth and Ipswich came within 120mm of being swamped by a North Sea tidal surge. A controversial ‘managed realignment’ could sacrifice 6,000 ha of the Norfolk coastline to rising sea levels, according to the Environment Agency.”

Full details on the ICE website