A £200 million project to protect Leeds from the risk of extreme flooding has been completed.
After more than a decade of work and a huge investment into state-of-the-art technology, the scheme will protect more than 4,000 homes and 1,000 businesses along the River Aire.
It comes after the devastating floods of 2015, that caused more than £36 million worth of damage as dramatic pictures showed city streets submerged under murky rainwater.
Coun James Lewis, the leader of Leeds City Council, described the unveiling of the scheme as a “very important and proud day” for the city.
After more than a decade of work and a huge investment into state-of-the-art technology, the scheme will protect more than 4,000 homes and 1,000 businesses along the River Aire.
It comes after the devastating floods of 2015, that caused more than £36 million worth of damage as dramatic pictures showed city streets submerged under murky rainwater.
Coun James Lewis, the leader of Leeds City Council, described the unveiling of the scheme as a “very important and proud day” for the city.
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NewsTranscript
00:00I'm Councillor James Lewis and I'm the leader of Leeds City Council.
00:04What we've seen is, over the last 20 years, is the number of times the river air rises
00:11because of heavy rainfall happening more and more often.
00:15So Boxing Day 2015 was particularly devastating in Kirkstall.
00:19We've also seen floods in the city centre that have closed the railway station.
00:23We've seen floods right across the city where the river rises and the flood water
00:29can go through, literally through people's homes and businesses.
00:33It's absolutely devastating for people when that's happened.
00:35I've seen it in the area where I'm a councillor.
00:38The impact it has on people's lives is devastating.
00:41So what we've got here is a scheme to try and protect more of the city from flood water
00:47in the rivers.
00:48This bit of the scheme is about holding back flood waters.
00:51There's other bits of the scheme that are around raising the river banks so the river
00:55stays in its course and isn't going out.
00:57So it's a combination to try and reduce the risk of flooding, try to stop that devastating
01:03impact on people when they are affected by flooding and to have a more sustainable city.
01:09How confident can people be that this is going to work?
01:12Because after what happened in 2015, people might be asking questions about how much they
01:16can trust a scheme like this and how much work has been put in.
01:20The average person might not know that £200 million has been spent on this.
01:23What would you say to them?
01:25I think it is, you know, this scheme was in response to 2015 and one of the reasons we
01:30know the floods in 2015 were so devastating was because the river dispersed its banks
01:34all the way through and literally ran down Kirkstall Road rather than in its natural
01:41course.
01:42What this scheme is about is about keeping the river in its course through Leeds.
01:46But also in areas like this it's about actually holding back those flood waters so that when
01:52the river levels are really high, the water is held back and further down the river, the
01:59river levels are lower when we know the river is high and I think that's an important part
02:03of it.
02:04We've seen the flood defences elsewhere in Leeds prove successful in those times of really
02:12high river levels.