Managing flood risk

Engagement

In Hull, people are at the heart of driving change. A big part of our approach to managing flood risk is to adapt people’s perceptions about flooding and water. Most of our engagement is carried out with the Living with Water partnership. So far, we have engaged with thousands of people to raise flood awareness and increase resilience.

Community engagement

The vision behind community engagement is to increase personal flood resilience.

This will help people be aware of their own flood risk and learn how to take actions to be prepared in the event of a flood. Being flood aware and being prepared will greatly reduce the -

  • time
  • stress
  • cost

of recovering from a flood.

Two images of the community engagement that has previously taken place.

2 images of the community engagement that has previously taken place.

Community engagement is an important part of communicating flood risk because -

  • it helps to find and share local knowledge to improve our understanding of local flood risk
  • it brings communities together
  • we can support local flood community champions
  • we can offer advice on becoming more flood resilient

Community flood resilience champions

To help build a positive relationship with the communities we work in, we have worked with a team of Hull and East Yorkshire volunteers to recruit and train Living with Water ambassadors. As well as joining our team at a variety of community events and playdays, the ambassadors have been involved in a range of projects. Examples include -

  • knowledge shares with students at the University of Hull
  • attending Virtual Horizons plays to discuss flood resilience with the audience
  • aiding the development of a flood resilience board game

The Living with Water ambassadors are integral to helping build community confidence and flood resilience. They have shared experiences of events, such as the 2007 floods. They have a closer relationship with the members of the community that they are part of.

Educational engagementAn image of our educational engagement taking place at a school

Visiting schools and offering flood-themed lessons and activities helps to teach children about flood risk. Engagement with schools is important as -

  • it provides the opportunity to link up research projects with learning activities
  • it enables schools to be more resilient to flood-related events. As a result, there will be less disruption for children’s learning and education
  • it provides children with the skills, knowledge and expertise around water management and climate adaption. It will help not only in their personal lives but also with future training and careers
  • we can support local schools with flooding and flood-related learning resources
  • it promotes a positive relationship between children and the environment
  • it teaches children about the risks of water
  • children share what they have learnt with their parents
  • today’s children will be the future’s flood champions

Living with water offer free school lessons and other educational resources are available.

Stakeholder engagementAn image taken at one of our Stakeholder engagement

Stakeholder engagement is another important part of communicating flood risk as -

  • it helps us to identify gaps between industry and communities
  • it allows us to feed into the way industries, such as insurance, deal with flood recovery
  • it brings together different industries to support interdisciplinary approaches to flood risk management