Work to repair flood defences in a Northumberland town, which were damaged during the winter floods, is due to start next week.- the repair work at Haydon Bridge will be carried out by the Environment Agency in two phases and will permanently repair flood defences.

The first phase wihich starts at the beginning of August, includes:

• Erosion repairs on the River South Tyne. Repairs to the erosion on the north and south banks will be carried out using some of the gravel within the river channel. The Environment Agency is working closely with Northumbrian Water so that this repair work also protects their sewer within the bank side repair.
• Temple Houses flood wall. Starting during the same week, repairs will be carried out to the erosion damage beneath the flood wall at Temple Houses to ensure the structural integrity of the wall.

The second phase of work, which is expected to start later in August, includes:

• Repairing the flood bank at Martins Close and Rocksprings Crescent and raising low spots behind Rocksprings Crescent.
• Repointing Brigwood flood wall and altering the outfalls along the wall.

The work, which is expected to be complete by the end of September, will permanently repair flood defences to the standard of protection they provided before the winter flooding this past December. The work is part of a £3 million Environment Agency recovery programme to restore damaged flood defences.

Environment Agency Operations Manager for the North East, Alan Cadas, said the Agency was now in a position to carry out repair works in Haydon Bridge - the programme of recovery work, to get the defences back into the condition they were in prior to flooding, is a challenge, he added.

Since December the Environment Agency, Northumberland County Council and Northumbrian Water have been working together to tackle flooding in the Tyne Valley. This includes repairs to flood defences, sewer network maintenance, repairs to the highways infrastructure and improving community resilience.

Steve Robson, Northumbrian Water’s technical support team leader, commented:

"Northumbrian Water is committed to continuing to work in partnership to help reduce flood risk in the Tyne Valley."

"As part of this work, in Haydon Bridge, we have used cameras to survey more than 3,000 metres of sewer pipe and cleansed more than 1,200 metres of pipe. We have also relined sections of pipe under the level crossing and on the north bank of the River Tyne."

Investigation work is also currently being carried out in partnership with the Environment Agency, to enable the water company to understand how surface water can be prevented from entering the sewer network.

Work to identify what more can be done to reduce the risk of flooding in affected communities and to increase resilience to flooding is also underway.