An innovative first for Wales has solved a persistent flooding problem and claimed a national award in the process.
The Mill Lane flood prevention project has just won the prestigious ICE Wales Cymru 2022, Roy Edwards Award, for the best example of outstanding design and construction of a project costing less than £5million.
The ICE (Institution of Civil Engineers) Wales Cymru Annual Awards are presented to the country’s top civil engineering projects.
The Mill Lane area of Beaumaris had required repeated interventions over several years to prevent flooding to local properties. These incidents and level of damage continued until the Isle of Anglesey County Council developed a wholly innovative and highly cost-effective project to reduce the risk of flooding.
Ruthin-based WaterCo were appointed as specialist design consultants and Alun Griffiths (Contractors) Ltd appointed for the construction of an innovative screen. This is the first time such a solution has been used in an urban environment in Wales.
WaterCo Senior Flood Risk Management Consultant, Shaun Wasik explained, “The design solution incorporated a fully automatic self-cleansing screen with three further levels of resilience, namely a bypass screen, medium level overflow back into the river channel and an additional overflow that utilised the surface water drainage in the adjacent carriageway.
The new design would require minimal maintenance and remove significant health and safety hazards to the Council’s operatives who until the new screen became operational, were required to manually clean the existing screen under flood conditions.”
Utilising the County Council’s existing NEC 3 Term Maintenance Contract with Alun Griffiths (Contractors) Ltd, the team were able to quickly mobilise and worked in an open and fully collaborative manner to construct the new screen and ancillary works in the summer of 2021.
Group Engineer with Anglesey Council’s Highways Service, Rowland Thomas said “This is the first project of its kind in Wales. We still have a lot to learn about this type of work, but as our experience grows, we’re hoping to share our learning so it can benefit other locations threatened by flooding throughout Wales.
“Valued at £250,000, this was an extremely cost-effective investment, which provided hugely significant benefits to the environment, and will reduce revenue costs for the Council into the future.”.
Anglesey’s Highways portfolio holder, Cllr Dafydd Rhys Thomas, added, “With the increasing threat of climate change and extreme weather-related incidents, adequate flood defences are essential to protect communities. We are working with partners on new innovation, like this award-winning scheme at Mill Lane, to help reduce the risks of flooding.”
Regional Director, Owain Thomas of Griffiths said “We are delighted to have won this prestigious award as it recognises that an innovation project doesn’t have to cost the earth and that the important role flood risk management continues to play in this ever-changing climate. We at Griffiths are proud to have played a part in the introduction of this innovative screen to Wales.”
Watch this short video for the full project overview.
