Before After Hampshire County Council's new Household Waste Recycling Centre in Alton, Hampshire, was to be located over the route of a shallow seasonal drain. The Environment Agency required a new and similar replacement channel to be created outside of the centre. Opportunity was taken to to do far more than this.
Indeed even before starting it was necessary to rescue a very large toad population in the wetter areas and a colony of slow-worms in the drier areas. The idea was to combine Habitat Creation with a Sustainable Drainage System (SUDS) and to demonstrate best practice at the local scale.
A new channel was created, deeper than the original so as to hold water for longer, and several deeper pools were created along the route of the new channel to create areas of permanent open water. Emergent plants were re-established from the original ditch. Water levels are controlled by a series of adjustable timber board wiers. Land to either side is managed by seasonal mowing to restore the original floodplain meadow herb-rich vegetation.
Surface water stored within an underground tank within the recycling centre is passed through an oil separator and fed at a slow controlled rate into one of the pools. The wetland vegetation within the new system now further cleans the water prior to passing through the system and into the nearby Caker Stream.
Anybody visiting the Alton household waste recycling centre can now walk around the back and see sustainable drainageand nature conservation working hand in hand. Here now are dragonflies, frogs and toads, sticklebacks and during a recent press photo session, even a kingfisher flew down the new stream. It is intended that the whole area be maintained by a local community group as a nature reserve.
|
Copyright © The Environmental Project Consulting Group 2002 |
|
