Sturt Road Flood Alleviation Scheme

Thanks to the relationships I have developed with Network Rail quizzing and meeting them on their proposals for The Hatches level crossing, I was able to get a lot of additional detail on the various issues and initiatives.

And guess what? There’s a lot more to it than getting Surrey County Council to clear the drains.

Some of the information I received is below:

  • This is a longstanding issue with some relatively complex interactions.
  • The notes and diagram below help show the completed and ongoing work by both Network Rail and Surrey Heath/ Surrey County Council in alleviating the issues.
  • NR have proven the syphon (highlighted yellow below) and formalised the outfall of this.
  • NR have uncovered and proven pits linking highways gullies (highlighted) in green to outfall on NR land.
  • Surrey CC are aware of the assets under the bridge and have jetted these to clear the system.
  • NR have cleared both the ditch (orange arrows) and piped (blue arrows) systems circled in red to improve flow and clear blockages.
  • Further works planned next financial year to spot repair culvert to the North of the railway (highlighted blue) – note; this is not preventing water flowing currently.
  • There is a system under Bartlett place (not NR owned – Thames Water/landowner) that helps drain the northern section of under Sturt Road bridge (blue dashed line).
  • The SHBC Drainage Engineer is leading on development of a scheme (circled blue to right) that will intercept water from the railway at outfall and pump this out to the Basingstoke Canal.
  • This will reduce the amount of water heading towards Sturt Road to reduce flooding.
  • This is linked into funding from the residential development on the site of the Mitie land to the west of Sturt Road.
  • In theory, the proposed drainage for the new residential site will encompass and attenuate the flows from the land (with less water out on to the frontages of Sturt Road).

There is more going on that cannot be revealed in detail publicly yet.

There is a multi-organisation deal in the final stages of negotiation that will involve a six-figure sum changing hands to create a new drainage scheme that will collect the rain falling in the 30 hectares of Frimley Lodge Park and pump it into the Basingstoke Canal instead of going down Sturt Road.

This will reduce flooding on Sturt Road, waterlogging in Frimley Lodge Park and car park, and give the Basingstoke Canal a much-needed boost in water supply.

When this goes public there is much kudos to be acknowledged within SHBC for this scheme.

Stuart Black, 21 May 2023.