A project aimed to demonstrate how you can make a “flood repairable house”, which included identifying barriers and proposing solutions to promote low cost measures that would make properties at flood risk more resilient to damage from flood waters.
Project Summary
A research project funded by Defra, with the main goal of identifying the main barriers to flood resilience solutions, and the proposal of low-cost approaches to flood resilience for properties at risk of flooding.
Several resources were to be created as project outputs a result of this project, in order to help fulfil the objectives of this research. These are also included on a free-to-access website that presents the project’s findings, which also include a range of case study examples of what people have done to make their property flood resilient.
You can also read about the methods that have been taken during this project.
Project Outputs
- Final Report : FD2682 Supporting the uptake of low cost resilience FINAL to be published
- Information Leaflet : Flood Repairable digital testimonials links
- Information Leaflet : Flood Repairable House practitioners’ handbook
- Information Leaflet : Flood Repairable Kitchen Booklet
- Information Leaflet : Flood Repairable Resilient Kitchen Flyer
- Information Leaflet : MAKING YOUR HOME FLOOD REPAIRABLE general version
- Literature Review : FD2682 Rapid Evidence Assessment Final Report July 2016
- Technical Report : FD2682 Technical Report Final Report July 2016
Website
In order to support the project, a website was set up which demonstrates the lessons learned from the project and allow this information to be freely available to home and business owners in the UK.
The website address is www.floodrepairable.wordpress.com which hosts a range of resources and content for property owners in the UK. This site uses an “action research” approach and is focused on working with communities to meet the objectives above.
Objectives set for the project
- Provide evidence for measures that would make properties more resilient to damage.
- Generate understanding of the behaviour of households and the property support network (PSN) and their interaction.
- Design innovative practices to exploit opportunities to increase awareness and take up of measures.
- Demonstrate these innovations in one community, to evaluate their potential.
- Summarise the lessons learned from the demonstration and evaluation of the outcomes from the community trial phase, and derive proposals for addressing gaps or new needs.
Methods used throughout this project involved
- An assessment of the costs and benefits of selected low cost flood repairable measures and illustrative packages of measures.
- A rapid evidence assessment, including use of academic literature, consultation with panel of experts, interviews with flood reinstatement and property protection professionals, interviews with occupants of properties where flood repairable measures have been adopted.
- Demonstration project to explore innovative approaches that could be used by local agencies and businesses to address some of the barriers to the use of flood repairable measures.
Case studies
Overall 10 case studies were prepared as part of the project to highlight the various aspects of designing a house to be flood resilient and the impact that particular measures can have on a building.
These case studies are all available through the Flood Repairable website.
Further information
Overall, this project developed illustrative packages of repairable measures, each suitable for different house types, which could prove to be cost effective for properties in the UK. Out of the 139 measures, 104 were those that directly applied to building fabric while 35 were related to contents and other strategies.
For the full details of the project, please click here.
