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Entec and FRM > Project experience: North East

Marton West Beck Hydraulic Model

Client: Middlesbrough Borough Council

During November 2000, serious flooding occurred within the Marton West Beck and Ormesby Beck catchments of Middlesbrough, including some flooding of properties. The preceding rainfall resulted in a saturated catchment and the cumulative effect of this rainfall is thought to have been equivalent to a storm of magnitude in excess of 1 in 100 year return probability.
Entec’s review and appraisal of flood hydrology included:

a re-assessment of catchment characteristics, determining the percentage of urban areas and effect of hydraulic controls, e.g. reservoirs, culverts, etc;
the calculation of design flood flows for the Marton West Beck and Ormesby Beck catchments, to allow a hydraulic assessment and flood risk evaluation to be undertaken. This took account of the Reservoir Storage (60,000 m3) at Albert Park and upstream at Coulby Newham;
analysis using standard ‘flood studies report’ (FSR) analytical techniques to estimate design flood flows using the ‘unit hydrograph’ (U-H) method and proprietary software, micro-FSR Version 2.1;
production of a tailor-made routing model specific to the ‘Albert Park Lake flood relief scheme’, developed by Entec for the purpose of this study using fortran code; and
hydraulic modelling performed using the steady state river analysis package, Hec-Ras. During the modelling phase numerous scenarios and return period options were considered and feasible options to overcome flooding were developed.

Eastgate Renewable Village

Client: Weardale Task Force

Entec is currently commissioned by the Weardale Task Force, to provide wide ranging environmental support services for a proposed renewable energy village at Eastgate, on the site of a former cement works. The proposed development will utilise all five forms of renewable energy available to inland UK locations and the development has a key role to play in re-energising the Wear Valley. A central aspect of the proposal is to provide an exemplar for sustainable development and to provide a leading, regional tourist destination. At present the core aspects of natural hot-water spa facilities along with a championship mountain bike venue are incorporated into the masterplan, along with a number of other integrated attractions and links into the local community.

Entec's role is to advise on all environmental issues and lead the undertaking of an environmental impact assessment to support the planning application. Our remit extends to advising on the tourism and socio-economic aspects of the scheme and to this end we are working closely with RHA Tourism to help define visitor numbers for the site, to maximise these via market positioning and profiling and development of the 'visitor offer'. The positioning of the development is key to maximising its potential from a regenerative aspect and integration of the development within the local community in Eastgate and the wider dale. Influencing of the masterplan from a tourism and environmental perspective has been a key role for the team and a number of key meetings and workshops with stakeholders (including the local community) have been held to help develop an exemplar, forward looking development.

As part of the project, Entec completed an FRA. The former cement works is located on flat concrete ground to the north of the River Wear and partly within the Environment Agency’s Flood Zone 3. Recorded flood extents of the Wear from 2005 did not match the Zone 3 outline, therefore a site specific hydraulic model was constructed to refine the flood zones. The revised zones were used to perform the sequential test in developing the site layout. Land to the south of the river rises steeply towards the disused quarry area and the gradient of the slopes naturally confine the floodplain close to the river. Outline calculations on existing and future runoff and recommendations for use of SuDS were also developed.

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