Slow The Flow and Calderdale Council are keen to engage with landowners or tenant farmers in the uplands above the Calder Valley who have farmland or woodland and who would like to help reduce flood risk in the valley around the Calder Valley.
Examples of Natural Flood Management (NFM) on farmland could be the construction of shallow attenuation ponds storing large quantities of water which empty once the storm has passed. Please see our Case Study for an example of an attenuation pond constructed on farmland above Todmorden. Or it could be the construction of leaky woody debris dams similar to those constructed at Hardcastle Crags. See more details here.
The footage below is of two Attenuation Ponds constructed near Hebden Bridge which collectively can store 500,000 litres of water during a storm.
You can also see how little impact attenuation ponds have on the landscape.
They are an excellent method of storing water and slowing the flow in the uplands resulting is less volume finding its way to the towns below.