The Flood Hub

Located on the coast at the lower reaches of the Alt-Crossens and Lower Mersey river catchments, the area covering our Partnership spans 249 square miles (645 km^²) bordering Lancashire to the north, Greater Manchester to the east, Cheshire to the south and south-west, and the Irish Sea to the west.

A mix of high-density urban areas, suburbs, semi-rural and rural locations makes for a varied use of land, but overwhelmingly Merseyside is urban. Liverpool Urban Area is the fifth most populous conurbation in England with its urban core focused around Liverpool City Centre.

In our Business Plan we have identified several key flood and coastal risks in Merseyside:

• Increasing flood and coastal erosion risks as a result of climate change
• Predominant surface water flood risk
• Ageing drainage infrastructure
• Rising groundwater levels
• Management of our coastline into the future

You can find more information about these risks in our Partnership Business Plan.

Table 1 puts the number of people at risk of flooding in the context of the size of the Local Authority’s population. As a result of its urban nature, Merseyside has a high surface water flood risk relative to other areas in the North West, whilst the flood risk from rivers and the sea is comparatively low.

Table 1: Flood Risks in Merseyside

Data Sources:

• Surface Water: North West Surface Water Property Count Dataset based on National Receptor Database 2011 [July 2019]
• Rivers and Sea: North West Flood Risk Management Plan [2015]

Note:

• ‘Properties’ includes both residential and non-residential property.
• * Liverpool City Council and Sefton Council have benefited from additional local modelling of surface water flood risk, with support from United Utilities and the Environment Agency. Outputs from that work are not shown in Table 2.

Further information on flood and coastal erosion risks in your local area can be found:

• On the Environment Agency’s website here.

• On your Council’s website (below) within their:
  • Local Flood Risk Management Strategy
  • Strategic Flood Risk Assessment
  • Preliminary Flood Risk Assessment
  • Published Section 19 Flood Investigation Reports

Knowsley Council – Flood Risk Management

Liverpool City Council –

• Extreme weather
• What to do in an emergency

Sefton Council – Drainage, Coastal Erosion and Flood Prevention

Wirral Council – Flooding

For more information on coastal flood risk management across the north west, visit our North West Coastline page here.

We work together as partners and with our communities and wider stakeholders to better manage and, where possible, reduce the impacts of flooding and coastal change in Merseyside. We do this in two main ways; proactively and reactively.

We proactively manage risk by:

• Commenting on planning applications to ensure water on new developments is managed sustainably and in a way that doesn’t increase risk to existing property and infrastructure.
• Working with planning colleagues and neighbourhoods to encourage appropriate policies for flooding and coastal change in Local Plans and Neighbourhood Plans.
• Issuing consents and permits for some works on watercourses.
• Maintaining a register of assets which can have an impact on flood risk.
• Delivering our Coastal Strategies for Sefton and Wirral and supporting delivery of the Shoreline Management Plan for the North West.

We seek opportunities to reduce risk through:

• Delivering our Investment Programme 2015 – 2021. Click here to see The Flood Hub’s interactive map and search for schemes, groups and events going on in your area. For more details on the programme, click here.
• Working with wider stakeholders, such as the Liverpool City Region, to seek multiple benefits from non-flood and coastal investment.
• Taking enforcement action on watercourses, where appropriate.
• The Environment Agency delivering a five year flood and coastal risk management asset maintenance programme. Click here for details.

Our Partnership meets quarterly at two different levels of Group:

Strategic Partnership Group

Tactical Officers Group

To view the Environment Agency’s five year flood and coastal risk management asset maintenance programme, click here. For more details on the programme, click here.

On this page you can find information of flood risk management schemes for areas within Merseyside.

Lunt Meadows (Completed scheme)

• Click here to download the Environment Agency Newsletter about the completed repair works at Lunt Meadows.

West Kirby (Completed scheme)

• For more information on the flood risk management for West Kirby, visit our dedicated page here.

Wallasey (Completed scheme)

• For more information on the flood risk management for Wallasey, visit our dedicated page here.

Local Authorities:

Knowsley Council – Flood Risk Management

Liverpool City Council – Extreme Weather

Sefton Council – Flooding advice

Wirral Council – Flooding

Other:

Liverpool City Region Year of Environment 2019

Merseyside Prepared

Misconceptions of flooding in the Wirral PDF

URBAN GreenUP – Liverpool