"Steve Haywood" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >On 06/03/07, Chris N Deuchar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> >> The trouble generally is that after a few years without a flood >> people assume it has 'stopped happening'. Shame really though. > > >Makes a change from the old days when even a modest amount of rainfall was >guaranteed to flood the valley between Birstall and Mountsorrel. It did it >every year without fail when I was a kid. > >Steve
Which is what kept the valley bottom soil so fertile, and much slowed the rise in the water level by spreading it over a large area. The 1970s fad for raising river banks and rushing the water downstream is now being seen as not a great idea, and there is consideration of reversing it in some places. On the Lee between Hertford and Ware, the water meadows can no long flood because the towpath was raised. The meadows are suffering. The view from boats is reduced. Better to keep the buildings out of the flood plain than the water, methinks. Adrian Adrian Stott 07956-299966
