Regional director of Wardell Armstong and Vice Chairman of Sheffield Property and Regeneration Committee (SPARC) Nick Tovey urges businesses to start the new year by remembering last year’s flood – and plan ahead now…

The aftermath and effects of June 2007’s floods are still very much an issue and concern for many. With this in mind, the South Yorkshire Green Business Club (SYGBC) and Sheffield Property and Regeneration Committee (SPARC), both sub-groups of the Sheffield Chamber of Commerce, considered it necessary to provide an update on actions being taken. 

An informative presentation from Peter Holmes of the Environment Agency demonstrated how the unusual weather built up over South Yorkshire and presented Sheffield with unprecedented rainfall and the subsequent flooding.  Delegates also learned how the rivers and tributaries initially reacted and filled in the west, followed by gradual but significant flow eastward, flooding Meadowhall and onto Doncaster. 

An explanation was also given of the overall responsibilities of the Environment Agency, Yorkshire Water and the Local Authority and of the riparian responsibilities of those with land abutting river banks (i.e. responsibilities for maintenance of river banks).  It was clear that this is a complex situation with many having a role to play.

The second presentation by John Charlton of Sheffield City Council’s Street Force outlined how the city reacted and responded to the crisis.  While again many people perhaps felt the infrastructure did not cope well, in fact, of the 72,000 gully pots in Sheffield it is estimated 94 per cent were running freely and it was simply the sheer volume of water that created the overtopping.  City engineers may sometimes be criticised but in this instance, Sheffield’s ‘Dunkirk Spirit’ came through and a magnificent job was done to mitigate the damage where possible.

Mr Charlton outlined a number of areas where lessons were learned and improvements will be made, as well as setting out the measures taken to ‘clean up’ the mess and carry out repairs.

A final presentation was given by Simon Ogden of the City Planners to explain the planning perspective.  It is a fact that Sheffield’s geography and industry was founded on rivers or on the flood plain.  It is not sensibly viable or in our interest to prevent development in our valleys and hence other solutions and measures will become necessary.

The outcome? More work is necessary by the Environment Agency, Local Authority and – importantly – ourselves as businesses.  The former are on with many actions and it is now also time for us to look at the measures we can take. 

The Chamber will be continuing to monitor and engage with business on the development of these issues.  In particular, we are planning further information events and a contingency planning event, lobbying government for additional funding and action with regard to insurance and keeping this issue high on the agenda.

To end on a positive note, Sheffield has in general recovered very quickly with business as usual. 

We must now keep an eye to the future and ensure the business community is ready for what hopefully will not happen for many years to come, but what must sensibly be regarded as a high possibility of a return event.

A meeting attended by more than 70 businesses was held in November which I chaired – and the points that came out of that meeting are as relevant in January 2008 as they were in November 2007.