ON Saturday, May 18, Crediton suffered some very heavy rain and that resulted in some flooding of the roads.

There's nothing that can be done about where it rains or when it rains or how much it rains but something can be done about the amount of flooding.

Plants growing along pavements in Crediton.
Plants growing along pavements in Crediton. (David Cann)

Flooding is the inability of water to move out of a location faster than it is entering the location.

The sensible thing to do is to remove any blockages and keep clear anything that might block.

Because Mid Devon District Council (MDDC) seems to have stopped sweeping the roads and the pavements to any visible level, all of the debris washes down to the drains, in some cases it covers the top so water flows on by down to the next drain, in others the drains themselves fill up and get completely blocked. 

This wouldn't be so bad if Devon County Council (DCC) were clearing the drains and pipes to allow the water to drain into the network rather than moving on to the next drain across the road or going through the underground pipe and simply popping up at the next low point due to a blockage.

DCC has in various places put in pavement or road level gutters covered in a grid to act as a surface drain to move water out of the way.

What they haven't been doing is keeping these cleared so that they are not blocked.

The one in East Street was reported as blocked in November 2022, and not until May 2023 did I receive a reply, but that advised that they weren't going to do anything, so it has no use despite the expense of putting it in.

The reason for putting it in was to help prevent houses from flooding.

It seems that between them MDDC and DCC don't want to do the basics.

If MDDC was sweeping the streets there wouldn't be the debris to block the drains.

You can tell the streets aren't being swept because you can watch the plants growing in the cracks and you can see the same debris on the pavement or the road month after month as the sweeping isn't being done.

Our Councillors live here yet that doesn't seem to make any difference to the situation.

Perhaps they should start talking to each other about getting the basics done.

David Cann

Crediton