Natural Flood Management Project

Download Riseley Natural Flood Management April 2025 by Graham Stanley (PDF, 7.4mb)

Wokingham Borough Council, with project support provided by members of Swallowfield Flood Resilience Group (FRG) has recently completed a natural flood management (NFM) scheme in woodland to the west of Riseley.  This project is the latest phase of a series of projects completed over many years, starting after the 2007 floods and then the formation of the Flood Resilience Group.  The Parish Council commissioned two significant reports from hydrological consultants which have been used to assess flood risks and identify flood relief projects which would best benefit the parish, the first project being design and construction of the swale at the end of Swallowfield Recreation Ground.

 The Riseley Natural Flood Management project was more difficult as it required co-operation from the landowner and ‘ordinary water course’s approvals from both Wokingham and Hampshire lead local flood authorities, as well as the Environment Agency.  The project has been funded by a grant from the Environment Agency and this enabled third parties to be engaged to carry out the detailed design, based on hydraulic modelling and recommendations in an August 2022 report.  Sixty-seven leaky barriers have been built across Coldharbour Wood, St Leger’s Copse and Collins Copse, to slow down water run-off, and several clay cored embankments have been built for floodwater flow diversion.

 It is stressed that whilst the work had been carried out in Riseley the whole parish will benefit as the leaky barriers and clay banks will slow down flood water run-off from reaching Swallowfield, where the Blackwater River is 35m lower than the woodland to the west of Riseley.

There are at least two other areas which have been identified as locations where further NFM techniques, including leaky barriers would help to slow down flood water should funds be available.

Graham Stanley, Chair FRG