Flood Map

This is a screenshot taken from the Environment Agency’s Flood Map; it shows the risk of Lambrok Stream flooding. We have dropped a yellow marker at the place where the access road to the planned development of 180 houses (planning application 20/00379/OUT) is intended to cross the Lambrok.

Here is how the EA defines its flood zones:

Flood Zone definitions as set out in the National Planning Policy Guidance

Flood Zone 1 – land assessed as having a less than 1 in 1,000 annual probability of river or sea flooding (<0.1%)

Flood Zone 2 –  land assessed as having between a 1 in 100 and 1 in 1,000 annual probability of river flooding (1% – 0.1%), or between a 1 in 200 and 1 in 1,000 annual probability of sea flooding (0.5% – 0.1%) in any year

Flood Zone 3 – land assessed as having a 1 in 100 or greater annual probability of river flooding (>1%), or a 1 in 200 or greater annual probability of flooding from the sea (>0.5%) in any year

But Lambrok Stream has already flooded Zone 3 and beyond three times this year. As the climate changes, as our weather systems bring stronger winds and heavier rain each winter, flooding is becoming more frequent and more intense, and these Flood Zones will need redrawing.

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Zone 3 flooding in the park in January.

Waddeton Park’s outline plan puts the access road on a causeway through flood zones 2 and 3. This is going to involve significant structural work if it is to keep the road above the growing threat of floodwater. It is also going to involve significant disruption of the Lambrok corridor, the ecological importance of which becomes more apparent every time we look.

Otters use this part of the stream as a route to feeding grounds in the moat at Southwick Court; there are water vole colonies along the banks and bullheads on the streambed; Odonata breed here. Southwick Court moat is an important reservoir of biodiversity for the area and the stream is its link to Southwick Country Park.

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1. Otter; 2. water vole.

The access road, the causeway and the bridge over the Lambrok will all have to be in place before this build can begin. It will be the only way into the site for the heavy lorries and their loads of bricks, timber and steel.

We feel that before Wiltshire Council approves this application it should request a detailed plan that will show how the developers are going to avoid disrupting this important wildlife corridor before, during and after the build. The potential for damage to the Lambrok’s biota is huge and, at this time of environmental crisis, very frightening.

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