Failure to enforce SuDS risks floods

摘要

As communities across the UK continue to be devastated by floods, why are local authorities not enforcing existing sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) legislation, and what is really causing the delays to the release of the national SuDS standards? Inland flooding is occurring more often for two main reasons. Firstly, weather patterns are changing, meaning rainfall events are happening more frequently, more intensely and for longer periods of time. In addition, as we continue to pave over porous green landscapes, rainwater is prevented from soaking naturally into the ground at source and instead accumulates and flows at high speed into water courses and drainage systems that were not built to cope with this deluge.