I agree with John Gummer that the government should use the Housing Act to prevent further developments in at-risk areas. Even as we watch unprecedented flooding taking place in northern counties, planning authorities here in the south are contemplating building on floodplains and their environs. Whatever the pressures for new housing land in the overcrowded south, the move is short-sighted and should be resisted.
Marion Pope
Bournemouth
• Have we unlearned how to manage rainfall once it hits UK soil? Around the corner, there is a new estate built on a slope. Virtually no trees, no grass to soak up the moisture (or for the children to play on), front gardens tiled to accommodate cars. A few hundred metres away, a 1950s estate – front and back gardens, lots of grass in public spaces, mature trees. A new climatic era poses new challenges and demands new strategies – but planners might make a start by refraining from flushing generations of common sense down the drain.
Paul Tattam
Chinley, Derbyshire
• If Cameron in his Cobra bunker really wishes to secure a lasting reputation, his government could reconsider its investment in HS2 and switch the funding to serious large scale flood defences. This would be a far greater visionary investment than the marginal and questionable advantages of HS2, which mostly benefits London by syphoning off the pressure on property values. The government should protect the properties of the north of England by investing massively in radical and visionary long term schemes, the precedent for which lies in the experience and foresight of the Low Countries.
Simon Clements
Sheffield
• One benefit of HS2 would be the PM’s ability to attend flood-based photo opportunities in the “northern powerhouse” more rapidly.
Robin Thomas
Wirral
More letters on the UK floods
• Time to get real about the UK’s flood defences
• Rewild the landscape to absorb storm waters
• Missing contour data hampers UK’s floods response
• Tories’ leaky policies on flooding leave us unprepared
• Floating structures go with the flow
• Join the debate – email guardian.letters@theguardian.com
