Flooding – New reservoirs considered

Flooding - New reservoirs considered

NEW reservoirs could be developed as a means to prevent future flooding in Downpatrick.

The possibility of such works being undertaken was confirmed at Stormont last week by Infrastructure Minister John O’Dowd in response to a question tabled by South Down MLA Andrew McMurray (Alliance).

At Wednesday’s Committee for Infrastructure meeting, the local representative asked the minister if there was “any update on interim measures” to prevent a recurrence of last autumn’s flooding, which devastated Downpatrick town centre.

“While the report into the flooding was generally welcome, there has been scant development of interim measures, which is leaving a lot of the people that were affected by the flooding extremely nervous as we come into autumn and possibly prolonged rain again,” said Mr McMurray.

Mr O’Dowd responded that last year’s flooding had been “devastating” and that a review had looked at the response to it, what lessons can be learned, and where and how it occurred.

“That information is then used to see what infrastructure or measures need to be taken to prevent that happening in the future,” the minister continued.

“So, the third step is the longest step in a sense, because you have to develop the plans.

“It is not simply a case of building a wall at ‘Point A’.

“You have to decide, if you build a wall at ‘Point A’, what impact does that have perhaps maybe three or four miles down the stream?

Mr O’Dowd stressed that “you can’t complete that work in the context of a review”, and that “it does take time to do that”.

“There are some incidences where we may have to look at putting in place new reservoirs to hold the amount of water that is coming into the system,” he stated.

“That will take a significant amount of preparatory work, it will take a significant investment, and it will take the cooperation of landowners, where you are going to go to those landowners and say, ‘We need your land for a reservoir’.”

Concluding, the minister praised the work of contingency resilience groups that work alongside Department for Infrastructure (DfI) officials in deploying sandbags, adding that “they can be a very effective immediate response to a flood”.

Expanding on Mr O’Dowd’s comments, DfI permanent secretary Dr Denis McMahon highlighted that there is “feasibility work ongoing” in relation to preventative infrastructure.

“Some of this may not be visible, but there is work ongoing to do the hydraulic modelling and to look to see what additional structures are needed around some key sites – for example, Downpatrick,” he stated.

In a subsequent statement, Mr McMurray said he had been “underwhelmed” by the minister’s response to his question.

“I appreciate that there can be no quick fix,” he stated.

“But I have to note my disappointment that, despite communicating with the department and the minister, the sole interim measure is to praise the work of community resilience groups.

“The minister’s official stated that feasibility work is ongoing and that hydraulic modelling is currently being looked at by way of deciding what additional structures could be placed at key sites to prevent further floods.

“The minister also suggested that one future defence against a flooding incident would to be to build reservoirs, presumably to store the floodwater instead of it swamping the town.”

Local SDLP MLA Colin McGrath has also called on DfI to “do more to address systemic and historic issues to prevent future flooding in Downpatrick”.

He said that since the “harrowing” scenes in the town last year, much had been promised, but little – including “a report on the flooding that a primary school class could have produced” – had been delivered.

“If the Executive, the council, and some local parties are serious about the future of Downpatrick, then we would need to see evidence of this from them and their party masters in the Executive,” the South Down representative continued.

“Downpatrick cannot be left to dwindle into oblivion.”