{"id":465723,"date":"2025-10-01T12:17:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T12:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/465723\/"},"modified":"2025-10-01T12:17:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T12:17:11","slug":"richmond-council-wins-award-for-flood-resilient-street","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/465723\/","title":{"rendered":"Richmond Council wins award for flood-resilient street"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barnes residents have praised Richmond Council for its award-winning efforts to make a residential street flood-resilient.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Kitson Road Scheme received the Steve Berry Highways Authority Innovation Award at the 2025 Highways Awards, which took place on September 23, and was a finalist in the Environmental Sustainability category. <\/p>\n

The project \u2013 which was completed in July \u2013 uses permeable paving and asphalt, as well as an absorbent material called Hydrorock to protect Kitson Road from flooding.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The road is now able to absorb rainfall, reduce surface water flooding<\/a>, and filter out pollutants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The council says the measures will protect 25 local homes.<\/p>\n

Councillor Julia Neden-Watts, Deputy Leader of Richmond Council and chair of the environment, sustainability, culture and sports services committee, said: \u201cI think the significance of the prize is that it draws attention to a different way of doing things and it highlights an issue that people increasingly need to think about.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt highlights the action we are taking in our communities to reduce problems in the future and of course it\u2019s really uplifting as well for the people who\u2019ve worked really hard on a project.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Neden-Watts explained that, prior to the works being completed, rainfall would pool on nearby Church Street and fail to drain.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Asked whether the council has similar plans for the future, Neden-Watts said: \u201cWe would love to, but we need to be methodical about it. We know there are other streets where people would like this to happen, but we need to manage expectations as to what we can do.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The councillor cited the need to find potential funding sources, as well as prioritising the streets which are most in need of repairs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barnes resident Charles Campion, 64, said: \u201cI think it\u2019s excellent that there are these initiatives.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cBarnes is vulnerable to flooding, being close to the river, and also with Beverly Brook coming down from Bushy Park<\/a>. So we need to do everything we can, really.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

One resident of the street, who asked not to be named for privacy reasons, said: \u201cWe\u2019re thrilled that it has been done.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I think we\u2019re lucky because they\u2019ve made it look smart.\u201d <\/strong><\/p>\n

The initiative, which also saw the installation of electric vehicle gullies, was carried out by Community BlueScapes: a partnership between London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, Barnes Common Limited, and the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Community BlueScapes is funded by the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (Defra).<\/p>\n

Those involved in overseeing the works included Henry Cheung, the council\u2019s assistant director of engineering; Lizzy Bunker, programme manager for Community BlueScapes; Mike Hildesley, chair of independent charity Barnes Common Limited; and Neden-Watts.<\/p>\n

Campion, who co-founded an initiative called the Barnes Ponder, said: \u201cCommunity BlueScapes has been fantastic in consulting with the local community and coming up with projects together.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cThey\u2019re doing such a good job that hopefully it will continue and it will also inspire other neighbourhoods to think about their flood resilience.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Barnes Common Limited says<\/a> that the district is vulnerable to heavy rainfall, poor drainage, potential overflow of nearby streams and rivers, waterlogged ground in wetter months, and other factors. <\/p>\n

The council\u2019s three-phase refurbishment<\/a> of the Teddington Lock Footbridges was also shortlisted for Bridge Project of the Year at the ceremony.<\/p>\n

Featured image of Henry Cheung, Lizzy Bunker, Mike Hildsley, and Julia Neden Watts. Credit: Richmond Council <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Barnes residents have praised Richmond Council for its award-winning efforts to make a residential street flood-resilient. The Kitson…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465724,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7757],"tags":[748,5554,52506,5034,393,728,37806,155464,4884,155465,257,26460,69026,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-465723","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-london","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-community","10":"tag-community-action","11":"tag-council","12":"tag-england","13":"tag-environment","14":"tag-flooding","15":"tag-floodproofing","16":"tag-great-britain","17":"tag-local-council","18":"tag-london","19":"tag-richmond","20":"tag-richmond-council","21":"tag-uk","22":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115298870504000083","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465723","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465723"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465723\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465723"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465723"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465723"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}