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Drain London

The facts:

Title:  Drain London
Client:  Drain London Forum / Greater London Authority
Location:  Greater London
Services:  Programme Management / Flood Risk Management
Sector:  Environment
Contract Type:  Transport for London Framework
Project Value:  £667,000
Start:  March 2010
Completion:  December 2011

The project:

The ‘Drain London’ project began after an initial high level assessment of surface water flood risk across greater London indicated that approximately 680,000 properties may be at risk of surface water flooding.

The project was overseen by the Drain London Forum which was formed in 2007 with the aim of achieving better management of surface water flood risk within London. The Forum includes representatives from Defra, the Environment Agency, the Government Office for London, the Greater London Authority, London Councils, the London Development Agency, Thames Water and Transport for London, as well as the 33 London boroughs. The project, which was being funded by a £3.2million grant from Defra, was run on the Forum’s behalf by the Greater London Authority.

Capita Symonds’ Flood Risk and Water Management team was appointed as joint lead consultant with Scott Wilson / URS by the Forum to programme manage the project. This included the specification and delivery of Surface Water Management Plans (SWMP) across all 33 London boroughs, comprising a total population of 7.63 million and 3.2 million homes.

Capita Symonds was involved in the project from the outset in partnership with Scott Wilson / URS. Initially the partnership was responsible for creating technical frameworks and tools to provide the basis for the management of data, flood modelling and collaborative working. These frameworks were used to ensure that all project outputs were consistent and comparable, as well as promoting cross-organisational collaboration between the public authorities responsible for flood risk management. They also fostered a partnering ethos between the engineering consultants undertaking the majority of the work. Getting these frameworks in place at the start of the study was critical to the success of the project due to its unprecedented scale in terms of area covered and stakeholders involved.

Following the project initiation, the Capita Symonds with Scott Wilson / URS partnership also carried out a large part of the work to develop the SWMPs for 17 of the 33 London boroughs as part of phase two of the study. Here the main challenge was developing collaborative working approaches between boroughs and key stakeholders such as the Environment Agency and Thames Water. Phase two was delivered in four stages:

1. Preparation – Review available data, consolidate partnerships with key stakeholders, agree requirements and establish objectives.

2. Risk Assessment - Surface water modelling to identify critical flood risk areas, scale and impact.

3. Options - Identify flood mitigation options/measures (with input from partners), including opportunities for joined up working.

4. Implementation and Review - Prepare and implement action plan, followed by monitoring and staged review.

A third phase of the project will follow the delivery of London wide SWMP documents and will make use of the key outputs from phase two of the study including a comprehensive understanding of surface water flood risk and an action plan to implement management measures. Phase three of the study will also deliver a selection of flood risk management measures ranging from green roofs to community flood plans and infrastructure resilience measures.