• Floods Meeting with Jilly Johnson

A meeting has been organised with Jilly Jordan, the Bucks Council Deputy Cabinet Member Environment and Climate Change. This will take place in the HVVH small hall on Tuesday 14^th January at 7.30pm. This meeting will be for the HVRA committee plus residents that have been directly affected by the flooding near the Harrow and similarly affected residents in Bryants Bottom. These residents will be contacted by a leaflet drop.

It is anticipated that a further meeting will be held with a wider audience later to present potential NFM measures, as below. We are then hoping that any promised NFM work would be combined with improvements by Bucks Council to the drainage network.

The DIG are trying to get a meeting with Steve Broadbent, the Cabinet Member for Transport, but has been met with no response so far.

• Natural Flood Management Work

Andrew Morsley’s work has continued this month, this includes covering Bryants Bottom in has analysis. BB suffered bad flooding in 2018, but this continues to be a threat, mostly from field runoff.

Andrew has indicated that once he has completed his field work, he will develop the concept for natural flood management opportunities for Hughenden. He will then build a model to verify them. The plan then is to host an event in early 2025 for the local community to go through the opportunities and prioritise them.

• Paper Submitted to Flood Response Committee

The committee findings report from the inquiry has been circulated to the DIG distribution and has been placed on the DIG website on the documents page for wider access.

• Thames Water

I have a done a chase up on Maisie Banks, out TW customer representative. She has confirmed that the analysis promised for a hydro-brake for Hughenden Valley is still very much ongoing. No promise of a date on that, which is less of a surprise.

Paul Woodford

2 Dec 2024

• Flooding this Month

Another flooding event happened in the Warrendene area, on Saturday 19^th October following a prolonged downpour. The Harrow was flooded internally as was at least one of the houses along Valley Road towards Deeters.

Following efforts by David Carroll on our behalf, he has been able to hold an online meeting with Jilly Jordan, the Bucks Council Deputy Cabinet Member Environment and Climate Change. She has provided us with a detailed letter, with input provided by the Flood Management team. This is attached for you to read.

Jilly has agreed to a meeting with us and residents in the New Year. HVRA DIG intend that this  this meeting should be a start in getting a Capital Works project underway for Warrendene.

HVRA will discuss this letter with David Carroll at the Tuesday 5^th Nov monthly meeting. We have noted several inconsistencies in the letter and will reply to Jilly in the next few days about them. Meanwhile, it is attached for you to read.

• Update from Andrew Morsley on Natural Flood Management

As you know, Andrew is engaged through Bucks Council investigating the causes and producing potential solutions to the surface water making its way down to and causing flooding in Warrendene. Andrew reports:

• I have installed a camera at Winnies cottage and a pressure transducer in the ditch on Warrendene rd.  We captured the storm 10 days or so ago.  I will retrieve camera data next week:

1. I have meeting with a number of landowners, including Hampden estate this week.   I will follow up with site visits in the coming weeks.   If appropriate I will invite you along.
2. Modelling has been been commissioned; I expect initial results in December.
3. We have spoken to the council about property flood resilience (PFR ) and they have agreed that this can form part of our recommendations and they are exploring funding options.

• Paper Submitted to Flood Response Committee

We provided a paper to the Bucks Select Committee on Flood Response in mid-September, which was circulated to the DIG.

The committee has just issued its findings from the inquiry. I will circulate that in the next week or two.

Paul Wooodford

4 Nov 2024

I am sorry if you are a subscriber to the HVRA website and regularly receive notices of events etc from the website.

I have just been in the process of updating the DIG blog where I normally post articles on a regular basis, but had fallen behind in doing this. I hadn’t realised all the updates would be posted out to subscribers.

My apologies for this.

Rgds

Paul Woodford

Hi All,

               In my last mail I mentioned Andrew Morsley, a hydrologist working for the River Thame Conservation Trust (RTCT). He is known to a number of you because he stopped off and spoke with a number of residents in the Warrendene area on the day of the flooding there (23^rd September).

RTCT is engaged to work on Natural Flood management in connection with the flooding experienced in the upper reaches of the Hughenden Stream. His client ultimately is Bucks Council.

Sarah Mustapha and I met with Andrew and Chels Hotham (Andrew’s colleague and engagement officer) last week. This was essentially for us to provide an introduction to the DIG and for us to inform them as much as possible about our experience with all aspects of flooding (sewage, stream, groundwater, surface water) affecting our area. He wanted to understand our knowledge of risk points, experience with dealing with the Council and so on.

After the meeting we did a brief walk round the lower part of the Valley – the area most affected by sewage flooding in recent years. Then we moved on to the Warrendene area which Andrew has already visited, and we picked up David Anderson for a drive up towards Hampden Crossroads. David is a long-term Hughenden resident, with excellent knowledge of the surrounding countryside and was flooded recently (in addition to several times in the past).

A significant part of Andrew’s role is to liaise with local farmers to understand flow mechanisms, come up with options for flood retention measures. Andrew will then be modelling the impact of proposed measures and when justified and agreed to by landowners, ultimately build water retention measures on the farms.  So one of the first things we did was to call at Upper Warren Farm and spoke with Sally and Simon Lloyd. This provided Andrew with significant pointers on field and farm ownerships in the area. From there we went further up Hampden Road with Andrew noting risks/opportunities along the way.

We stopped at East Lane further up. This is a steep little used lane to the left; it is primarily from the steeply sloping field on the corner that Dave had experienced a number of times large amounts of runoff from the clay capped fields down onto the road, which would then run right down into Warrendene. We finished our tour with a stop at the Hampden Arms, where Andrew was able to pick up contact information for the Hampden Estate as well as more local knowledge on our issues.

Andrew will be engaged with this work in the coming weeks, which will involve liaising with Farms on flood management measures. The ultimate aim above Hughenden Valley will be to deal & reduce water sweeping down into our village through a variety of actions including:

• Creation of water runoff channels
• Swales
• Pools
• Ditches 

In the shorter term, it is hoped that the Council can be persuaded to implement immediate changes to the Warrendene area to reduce the flooding. These could include:

• Alterations to the Warrendene ditch
• Creation of pooling area
• Addition of extra resources to divert surface water from road into ditch
• Provision of assistance to householders to prevent flood water entering properties from road

Rgds

Paul

• Harrow Area Flooding

Following our follow up letter to Bucks Council on the February flooding, we received a response from the Council dated 5^th September from a Community Liaison Officer assuring us that they are confident that the drainage system in place is adequate and with proper maintenance the flooding will not happen again. Our request for a meeting has been ignored.

Since then, of course, the Harrow and multiple gardens were flooded on 23 September. It’s terrible that another flooding has occurred in the Harrow area following a very heavy period of rain over the weekend. From what understand the response from the Council and Fire Services has not been great

• Presentation to Flooding Response Select Committee

We provided a paper to the Select Committee for their meeting on Monday 23^rd September. The meeting was changed from the Aylesbury office to an online meeting because of flooding in the area.

• Chiltern Society & the Hughenden Stream

Paulw and Sarah Mustapha attended the 2nd Chalk Stream Project workshop on 15^th July about the Hughenden Stream Restoration Plan. This second meeting was to prioritise the works so that decisions can be made on what can or cannot be done, allowing for budget etc.

By December it is hoped that a document will be produced for public dissemination.

We were introduced to Robert Morsley, a consultant hydrologist from the River Thames Conservancy Trust. Robert has been assigned to the stream restoration project to investigate Natural Flood Management possibilities for the upper reaches of the stream, namely from the pumping station up to the top of Warrendene and beyond.

Paul Woodford

HVRA DIG

30^th Sept 2024

Hi All,

               It’s terrible that another flooding has occurred in the Harrow area following a very heavy period of rain over the weekend. From what we hear at this end of the Valley, the response from the Council and Fire Services has not been great.

On this subject I am enclosing a couple of letters in connection with our pursuing Bucks Council to take action regarding the repeated flooding. The first is our letter to the council of 5^th August which was following up again on the February flooding. The second letter is response from the Council dated 5^th September from yet another Community Liaison Officer assuring us that they are confident that the drainage system in place is adequate and with proper maintenance the flooding will not happen again. I will leave you to draw your own conclusions on that.

Yesterday Bucks Council held a Select Committee meeting on the response to flooding in Bucks. The DIG, along with other groups were invited to attend. In the event, I put in a paper expressing our views on the difficulties we have experienced over the years with flooding. I have attached this also.

On a slightly brighter note, yesterday there was a follow-up meeting at the Manor on the Restoration of the Hughenden Stream and Sarah Mustapha and I attended this. This workshop looked at prioritising the areas of work on the stream from a feasibility and benefit point of view. From this work it is expected that a draft plan will be produced and made available for public dissemination.

At the same time we were presented to by Andrew Morsley from the Thame Conservation Trust. The TCT has been appointed to survey and recommend Natural Flood Management measures affecting the Valley. This forms the next part of the Chalk Stream Project and looks at the upper reaches of the Hughenden stream and valley, roughly from the pumping station up to the top of Warrendene and then also flooding from beyond that point. It is hoped that in the fullness of time measures will be introduced to better manage surface water finding its way down into the valley.

Some of you affected by the flooding will have already met Andrew, as he stopped in the Harrow area yesterday before the Chalk Stream meeting to see for himself our issues over the flooding and spoke with a few of you. He may well be a familiar figure around Warrendene in the coming months.

Regards

Paulw

• Harrow Area Flooding

We have written to Rosie Tunnard in early August. This letter refuted the Council’s response that the Harrow/Warrendene area is properly maintained but was simply overwhelmed by exceptional rain that day in February.

We have requested a meeting to discuss works we consider necessary to improve the area’s drainage.

• Presentation to Flooding Response Select Committee

The DIG has been invited to present to the Bucks Council Select Committee on Flooding Response. Paulw will present on 23^rd September the result of our experiences with local flooding events and the council’s response to it.

• Thames Water

Overpumping at the Surgery now is largely forgotten; all  equipment is removed and a cleanup has been done. The field below the pumping station still looks a mess.

We are still pushing Thames Water for a solution to the Valley’s sewage network issues. Some hope that!

• Chiltern Society & the Hughenden Stream

Paulw and Sarah Mustapha attended the Chalk Stream Project workshop on 15^th July on the subject of the Hughenden Stream Restoration Plan. This was held at Hughenden Manor. It involves re-working the Hughenden Stream from down in High Wycombe up as far as the pumping station. It is being driven by the Chiltern Society and Environment Agency and is fully funded, so will be a significant project.

On 23^rd September there is a follow up workshop when a proposed list of alterations along the stream length will be agreed. At a future point a document containing proposed restoration options will be produced for public dissemination.

At some point the upper reaches of our stream (Pumping station to Warrendene Crossroads) will be surveyed also.

It is also understood that the Chalk Stream Project has been invited to work with Bucks Council on Natural Flood Management in Hughenden Valley.

Paul Woodford

HVRA DIG

1^st September

Hi All,

               Please find enclosed a short update on DIG activities.

• Harrow Area Flooding

We have not yet followed up with our reply to Bucks Council regarding the Harrow area floods. We need to do some more checks before writing to the Council and suggesting a plan for drainage improvement in the whole Warrendene and Harrow area.

• Thames Water

Pumping out at the Surgery has continued through June, although TW have reduced the revs on the overpumping equipment because of lowered sewer levels. A casual inspection at the month end suggests that the sewer levels are now very low and we expect the overpumping operation will likely stop soon.

The tankering from Boss Lane has now stopped and TW are looking to repair verges etc.

• Chiltern Society & the Hughenden Stream

Paul met with James Donald of Revive the Wye group 17^th June for Paul to be able to provide an introduction to the DIG and the upper reaches of the Hughenden Stream (from the park up to the top of Warrendene Rd). Paul will organise a meet up with James Donald late July to provide a walk of the upper reaches.

Since the meeting with James Donald, the DIG has received an invitation to attend a Chalkstream Project workshop on 15^th July on the subject of the Hughenden Stream Restoration Plan.

I attended a meeting with the Climate Group who have shown interest in this workshop and up to 4 of us will attend the workshop.

Rgds

Paul Woodford

HVRA DIG

Hi All,

               Just sharing a response from Maisie Banks regarding the overpumping units. We had felt that the pumps should be retained for a while longer because of the recent heavy rain, but obviously TW don’t think it necessary.

Rgds

Paul

From: Maisie Banks <Maisie.Banks@thameswater.co.uk>
Sent: Monday, July 8, 2024 2:36 PM
To: pbwoodford@icloud.com
Subject: RE: Hughenden Valley Status

Hi Paul,

Hope you are okay,

I have spoken to Lynda who has been monitoring the levels in within our sewer network, as the levels have dropped we turned the over pump off on Thursday 4^th July and since then we can see that the network has been coping with the flows.

Since the over pump has been off we’ve experienced rain fall within the area and have noticed that the ground water levels have also dropped. As we are happy that the network is coping and the additional flows that were getting in have reduced we will be arranging for the over pump to be removed as it’s no longer needed.

Please advise the residents that if they have any issue to call our contact centre on 0800 316 9800 or report an issue online so we can send out an engineer in a timely manner to investigate.

Kind Regards