Experts raise school to protect site and homes from flooding

WATER experts have been called in to safeguard a new £10.5m school site and homes nearby from risk of flooding.

Rhos Street and Pen Barras schools will be relocated to the Glasdir Farm site in Ruthin, Denbighshire, next spring – near the Glasdir housing estate, which suffered severe flooding in November 2012.

The school building, which will house two separate new schools, has now been raised two metres higher off the ground under plans by local flood specialists Waterco and contractors Wynne Construction. Denbighshire County Council called in Waterco to address the flooding risk.

Almost all 118 homes on the Glasdir private housing estate in Ruthin were affected by flood waters of up to three feet when defences were overwhelmed in February 2012.

A report from Waterco showed that while the threat of flooding is low under normal conditions the school site would be at “residual risk” in the event of a significant blockage of the nearby Llys Famau, Denbigh Road, and North Link Road culverts.

Civil engineer Chris Lewis, who led the Waterco team, said: “As a local firm we’re well aware that there has been a lot of concern about the flood risk.

“We have raised the level of the new school, which was already above the flood risk level, by between one and two metres and introduced measures so that in the worst-case scenario the water would run off onto the nearby playing-fields and to areas on the site before gradually dispersing naturally.

“This would mean that rather than flooding the houses on Glasdir, the flood water would be held there.

“That was the critical part of our job – to make sure that the measures we designed to protect the school weren’t creating a flood risk for anyone else.”