Aller: how an SRA grant helped to reduce flooding

Aller: Community Flood Action Fund case study

The Somerset Rivers Authority (SRA) Community Flood Action Fund gave Aller Parish Council a grant of £3,450 for a scheme to reduce the risks of flooding to 15 – 20 homes along Church Path in Aller. Aller Parish Council pledged match funding of £660.

Works focused on clearing a blocked ditch – marked thickly in red on the map below – from the corner of Aller Drove along Church Path to Middlemoor Rhyne, and a secondary ditch – marked in the map below with a dotted green line.

A map showing the locations of watercourses in Aller where SRA-funded CFAF works were done, primarily the ditch marked with the thick red line, secondarily the ditch with the dotted green line.

The council said these watercourses had not been cleared since at least 2016 and had become very overgrown. Their state was severely impeding the flow of water away from the village, thereby increasing the risk of flood water backing up and discharging through road gullies. Furthermore, the council added, high levels of polluted water could be seen pooling at the corner of Church Path, following the occasional operation of a storm overflow outlet.

The council told the SRA that the watercourses’ owners could simply not afford to do the scale of works required.

The council therefore wanted to get things back to a fit state. Once this was done, the council said it was committed to working with the Parrett Internal Drainage Board so that these watercourses could be properly maintained in future.

Works involved a heavy amount of tree surgery. Thanks to Aller Parish Council for all the photos that follow…

Contractors at work on a willow tree in Aller.

Note the rotten wood between the two machines.

This scheme was completed in full and within budget (£3,447.50 claimed from the SRA), although it had to be broken down into two phase. This was due to an un-anticipated problem with two trees being too close to power lines to be coppiced by the council’s contractors. The height of these two trees was reduced instead by National Grid contractors. Fourteen volunteers from the village also helped to process a larger-than-expected quantity of dead wood and other timbers.

Chipping into one vehicle, chucking onto another.

Aller Parish Council say the response from villagers to this scheme was “overwhelmingly positive”, with residents feeling a “greater sense of pride in place”, although some people expressed concerns about the loss of trees.

In response, the project team discussed with individuals the overall benefits of the scheme, and the fact that willows have traditionally been pollarded. For any future schemes, the council say they would communicate with the whole village before works started, not just residents living nearby, to avoid possible misunderstandings.