Memorandum submitted by Alison Lingham
(FL 42)
As a resident of the Wye valley, adjacent to
areas that flood regularly, I would like to comment about the
current use of fields bordering rivers such as the Wye and Severn.
Farmers are increasingly using this land for arable crops rather
than grassland, which has considerable impact when the area floods.
So much soil is being washed into these rivers, that they are
becoming increasingly silted up, and consequently less able to
carry away large amounts of flood water. We hear a lot about the
consequences of building on flood plains, but surely this change
in land usage from grazing land, where the soil is bound by grass,
to arable, is having just as much effect. The Wye, for example,
used to be navigable for barges carrying coal and ore from the
Forest of Dean, but is now only navigable by canoes.
Alison Lingham
August 2007
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