Golf course is to help solve Oldbury flooding threat
A golf course will be used to help solve problems of flooding on a new housing estate being built in Oldbury, it has emerged.
More than 100 new homes are being built on the site of the former Sandwell College campus in Pound Road.
However the area where the homes are going up has been classified as a flood zone.
Proposals have now been drawn up to help create a solution to the problem by using a section of the nearby Brandhall Golf Course as a "flood storage area" in an application that will be considered by borough planners next month.
Bovis Homes was granted planning permission to build 117 new homes in March 2010.
At that time there was no objection from the Environment Agency on the grounds of potential flood risk, but a condition of the planning permission was that various on-site drainage works should take place. But following the grant of the permission, the Environment Agency has reclassified the site as within a designated flood zone.
Planning documents submitted to Sandwell Council state: "Bovis Homes, Environment Agency, Sandwell Leisure Trust, Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council and Brandhall Golf Course have been working closely together with the common objective of identifying a sustainable flood alleviation solution to offer betterment to the downstream residential areas.
"The proposal will involve the creation of a flood storage area, within the northern extent of the golf course, with the objective of intercepting as much of the upstream catchment as possible.
"The flood storage area is designed to be online to the watercourse and will utilise a new embankment across the golf course to act as a barrier to the floodplain flows. A short diversion of the Brandhall Brook and its tributary from Wolverhampton Road will be necessary to divert flows to allow both sub-catchments to be attenuated by the scheme."
A number of mature and semi mature trees would be lost to the rear of eight to 16 Heron Road, but the applicants are proposing to replace them with a line of standard trees on the site boundary. A report to Sandwell Council's planning committee recommends the works are approved. Sandwell's planning committee will make a site visit ahead of a decision on March 27.
