On Sat, 19 Jun 2004 22:43:36 +0100, chris French
wrote:

In message , Dave S
writes
On Wed, 16 Jun 2004 23:29:29 +0100, chris French
wrote:


anyone have knowledge of this, or can point me to source of info?

Aforementioned colleague has more experience in hydrology than I -
I'll check with him next week on sources of information.


Well it seems the Norwich Union database is not quite as sophisticated
as it initially sounded. It seems they have a high resolution digital
elevation model, onto which they have mapped the position of
properties where flood claims have been made. The elevation of these
properties gives the elevation 'at risk of flooding' and by combining
the two they get the areas at risk of flooding. If your house is in
one of those areas they don't touch you and if not, they do.

So essentially it's a very broadbrush approach which is unlikely to
pick out the effects of topographic features or defences which would
protect individual properties. In principle, this would be possible if
combined with good hydrological data, but would be involved and
expensive to do for the whole country.

Local knowledge is probably your best bet - local newspapers can be a
good source of information on previous flooding. Local residents can
also be useful, be be aware that they are very prone to exageration!!

Although I lived near Ely for 6 months, I'm not particularly familiar
with the Fens. Since it is so low lying and largely artificially
drained, the potential for flooding has always been high. I suspect
that it is therefore better protected and the flood risk better
managed than in many other parts of the country.

Conversely, in many parts of the country, flood risk has been greatly
increased in recent years by changing land use (particularly
agricultural land), urbanisation, very poor river and catchment
management and to some extent by climate factors. Here, the flood risk
is very poorly managed and no-one seems to have a clue how to deal
with it, other than the pursuit of misguided hard engineering
approaches which have to a large extent caused the problem in the
first place.

Not that I'm bitter and twisted about having a proposal for research
funding to work in this area turned down, of course....!!!

cheers
David
--
David Shepherd
Wymondham,
Norfolk