More than 190 people attended the latest St Austell Bay Resilient Regeneration Project (StARR) public event at St Blazey Football Club on Saturday 29 June, to find out about on-going plans to reduce the risk of flooding in Par and St Blazey.

Our river table demonstrations helped illustrate the effects of flooding and how we can help alleviate them.

People were particularly interested in seeing how the removal of natural features dramatically sped up water flow between point A and B.

StARR is a £30M flood alleviation and regeneration scheme led by Cornwall Council in partnership with us, the Environment Agency, South West Water, the University of Exeter and Cornwall Development Company, with work scheduled from 2017 to 2020.

Our focus within the project is to work with local communities in the upper catchment to develop and deliver Natural Flood Management solutions.

From our perspective it was beneficial to show people it’s about the wider catchment and that the problem, although focused in Par and St Blazey is not solvable within the urban setting alone.

The overall project aims to work across the whole of the Par river catchment to reduce flood risk to communities living and working in the St Austell Bay area.