‘Development sites could have their own flood defences’
FLOODING concerns along the island’s east coast could be mitigated by individual development sites having their own defences, according to a director of a local architecture firm.
Andrew Merrett of Lovell Ozanne was making a representation at a public hearing on the draft Local Planning Brief for the St Peter Port and St Sampson’s Harbour action areas at Les Cotils yesterday.
Mr Merrett said that his firm was a proponent of an approach that balanced ambition and practicality in development, and believed that the brief could be fully realised. He said that decision-making by the States in relation to flood defences had been a ‘slow’ process, which prompted him to suggest that sites in the action areas could have their own flood defences, thereby contributing to a ‘whole’ coastal defence.
‘There needs to be less insistence of a flood resistance policy from the States,’ he said.
‘We would encourage each individual development site put forward to be responsible for their own defences.’
When asked by independent planning inspector Phillip Staddon about the nuances of such defences, how they might work and how they squared with flood risk evidence, Claire Barrett, director of infrastructure and environment at the States, said that a previously-commissioned flood evidence report – which detailed possible worst case scenarios for the island – had been ‘sobering and surprising’ about the time frames for sea level rises and their impact on major strategic infrastructure. She said that, because planning work for the harbour action areas had not been done, despite being identified within the Island Development Plan in 2016, major development had not been able to come forward.
‘The Development & Planning Authority didn’t want to do a brief that said “you’ve got to wait an X number of years for a strategic flood defence, so for X number of years nothing can come forward again”.’
She said it was about achieving a balance between allowing development to go ahead where the proposed land uses were not as susceptible to flooding, alongside more vulnerable uses.
‘It’s quite a big piece of infrastructure work to actually get a combined flood defence for the whole of the east coast effectively,’ she said.
‘It’s not just putting boards up, it’s building into developments, protecting people living there and not just pushing the water to sites next door.’
She added that Policy & Resources was alive to the need to progress flood defence options.
