New funding to help prevent flooding in March and other areas to be discussed

New funding to help prevent flooding across Fenland could be approved at a meeting this month.

Cambridgeshire County Council’s Environment and Green Investment Committee will vote on a proposal to mitigate against the risk of floods, as well as deliver nature restoration projects.

This includes projects in the town of March which suffers from the legacy of an old, combined drainage system which becomes overwhelmed on a frequent basis, leading to flooding of properties, businesses and roads, and the discharge of untreated sewerage to local watercourses.

The council is proposing to undertake a review of nature enhancing activities in other locations across the UK and Europe before working with Anglian Water to implement nature-based solutions.

This would be focused on public land such as parks and verges and could include rain gardens (a dip which receives run-off from roofs and other hard surfaces), green streets (vegetation to slow running water), holding ponds, planters and the replacement of impermeable surfaces with permeable ones.

This approach, used for the first time across an entire town, could then be replicated elsewhere in the county.

Further improvements to be voted on include carrying out flood risk assessments for areas which have been prone to flooding in recent years and which could see a re-occurrence in the future. This would enable action plans to be put together, including design work and costings, followed by applications for external funding to deliver the schemes.

Moreover, the committee will vote on whether to carry out a community-led nature restoration and environment management project for the entire county. The pilot programme would look at how community-led nature restoration plans can be created and implemented locally, before looking to roll them out across Cambridgeshire.

Funding for these scheme is expected to be around £1.7million over the next four years. The committee will vote on whether to spend that amount from the Just Transition Fund – a funding pot established in March to help the council become carbon net zero by 2030, and the entire county by 2045.

Cllr Nick Gay, vice-chair of the Environment and Green Investment Committee, said: “We know flooding has been a major issue for many of our residents, and this funding would help us achieve long-term solutions while also enhancing nature restoration across the county.”