‘Baltic Wharf homes will put people of Bristol at risk of death’

Floods are the most frequent and dangerous type of natural disaster, affecting around 100m people, and killing tens of thousands annually.

This includes 1,836 people killed in New Orleans in 2005, and 184 people in Germany in 2021. 100 houses were destroyed in Boscastle in 2004 and the 1800 homes flooded in Tewkesbury were part of an estimated cost due to flooding in 2007 of £6.5b.

Bearing in mind the death, misery and cost resulting from flooding, we might assume that Bristol City Council would take this very seriously, and would definitely not want to expose its citizens to the dangers of flooding by allowing developments in areas of high flood risk.

This brings us to the curious case of Baltic Wharf.

The developer, Goram Homes, has applied to build blocks of luxury flats on the site of what is currently Baltic Wharf Caravan and Motorhome Club, with the loss of most of its 100 trees and little chance that any of these will ever be replaced.

An illustrative masterplan of the proposed Baltic Wharf development – image: Goram Homes

The site is in the highest numerical flood risk area (flood zone 3), and both the Environment Agency and the council’s own flood risk team have consistently stated that this is a dangerous site for a residential development. The term used is “danger for all”, which includes both residents and emergency services, and even the developers admit that there is no possibility of a safe evacuation route.

If a development is in a high flood risk area, in order to be considered legally it must pass all of three tests.

The sequential test

Firstly, it must be shown that there is nowhere available for development with a lower flood risk. The developers claim to have passed this test, but failed to consider the nearby SS Great Britain car park. This is of lower flood risk and is available, in fact Goram themselves have identified this site as one that might be developed in their 2023 business plan. Even better, it is adjacent to a low flood risk zone, and therefore has a possible route of escape in the event of a flood.

The exception test, part one

Secondly, the development must demonstrate “wider sustainability benefits to the community that outweigh the flood risk”. It is estimated that the caravan park brings in over £1m in income to local businesses. With a loss of this income, there will be a reduction in sustainability for local businesses, and with the felling of 79 trees in an area of low tree cover, environmental sustainability will also be damaged.

The exception test, part two

Finally, the development must show that it is safe from flooding for its lifetime, defined as 100 years. This requires that residents and other users should be able to freely access and exit the development at all times and that emergency services have unrestricted access to the buildings, including during a flood.

Both the Environment Agency and the council’s flood risk team make it clear that this site is not safe from flooding, and indeed the developers themselves have admitted that “it is not possible to currently demonstrate a safe/dry access route to and from the site in the design flood events”.

Instead, the developers place responsibility for safety squarely on the residents themselves, expecting “residents to stay informed on the flood risk to the site”, and that they should “seek refuge on site”.

To be able to freely access their homes is a basic human right for the residents, but crucially, access is absolutely essential in the case of an emergency, such as a fire or the need for urgent medical attention resulting from accidental injury, illness, pregnancy or disability.

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Read more: Flood fears for plan to built flats on caravan park by harbour

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The development comprehensively fails all three tests, and therefore the case for its refusal is pretty clear. Approval has recently become even more unlikely thanks to the intervention of the secretary of state for housing and communities.

The Environment Agency has already declared that, should this development be approved, they would insist that the planning inspector review the decision, and the Secretary of state has instructed that the inspector should not permit other priorities, such as the need for housing, to override dangers of flooding.

Of course, this makes perfect sense – we would never countenance building dangerously defective houses simply to increase their number.

Goram has become ever more desperate to push this through. Since the application was registered in April 2021 they have submitted six separate flood risk assessments, matched only by six objections by the Environment Agency because the plan poses “a significant risk to life”.

Goram has even claimed that flood defences perhaps decades in the future would reduce the dangers of this development now, even though the council has stated that only flood defences that actually exist should be considered.

A council-owned developer is planning to build the flats on the site of the Baltic Wharf Caravan and Motorhome Club, next to the Cottage Inn pub

In an attempt to coerce the planning office they have cited other developments in high flood risk areas that have been allowed on appeal, without mentioning that these were allowed specifically because they provide an elevated evacuation route to adjacent low risk areas – something Baltic Wharf cannot do as the whole areas will be underwater.

Under normal circumstances, the council should not be held responsible for reckless developers trying to build in high flood risk areas, but in this case, they can. Goram Homes is a wholly-owned “subsidiary” of Bristol City council, with a senior member of Rees’s cabinet as its non-executive director. It is said that nothing that Goram does is done without the approval of the mayor’s office.

So, why is Goram spending enormous amounts of OUR money persisting with this clearly doomed application? The answer may be political. To abandon Baltic Wharf would also mean shelving the proposed Western Harbourside development – the so-called Harbour Hopes – as most of this is also in the highest flood risk area. This much larger development is the mayor’s flagship project, and were this to be shelved it would be a major dent in the mayor’s credibility as he prepares his bid to be MP for Bristol North East.

The mayor will rightly tell us that there is a housing crisis, and that “doing nothing is not an option”. One could say that putting the people of Bristol at risk of death should also not be an option.

John Tarlton is a professor of regenerative medicine at the University of Bristol and an environmental activist

Main photo: Martin Booth

Read next:

• Five architects shortlisted to transform former school site
• Dozens of women ‘marry’ trees under threat from new development
• ‘Significant risk to life’ remains if homes are built on car park

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