General election won’t stop work to cut ‘significant’ flood risk for homes in Sheffield

Sheffield City Council’s transport, regeneration and climate policy committee members heard how the fixing of a failed culvert on Clough Dike would be necessary to prevent a repeat of the flooding of nine homes in 2019 in Deepcar.

Clough Dike drains “a 74 ha catchment of urban, agricultural and recreational land into a stream, through a steeply graded valley of deciduous broadleaved woodlands, into the town of Deepcar where it enters the Fox Glen culvert”.

Clough Dike then drains to the Little Don downstream of Deepcar and the culvert under Woodroyd Road has “partly failed” and blocked which is presenting a significant risk of flooding.

As the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) reported last week, the council would need around £80k a year for temporary arrangements but was instead able to secure £1.4m from the government and the Environment Agency to fix the issue permanently.

Now, the members of the committee were told that the money was ready to be used – regardless of the outcome of the general election in July.

Cllr Alexi Dimond, the deputy chair of the committee, from the Green Party asked whether the project (the money needed to complete it) would be affected by the upcoming general election and any outcome of it.

He was told by James Mead, the council’s food and water manager, that the fund was “already allocated”.

“There is no concern in that,” he added.

Cllr Ian Horner (Beighton, Liberal Democrats) asked whether the huge amount of rainfall Sheffield has been experiencing for the last few months meant that the problem around culverts is more serious.

Mr Mead said they knew what was happening out there (with regard to culverts) but they don’t have a concern of this magnitude elsewhere at the moment.

However, he said: “We have had an exceptionally wet autumn into the winter and we are unfortunately seeing a lot of localised issues.”

A paper published ahead of this meeting said a flood in November 2019 resulted in internal flooding to nine properties and flood assessment suggests up to 35 homes could be at risk.

The committee will hear back on the situation surrounding culverts across the city, the members agreed.