DREDGING the River Foss could help protect York from a repeat of last winter’s floods, but Environment Agency (EA) engineers have all but ruled out doing anything similar on the Ouse.

The agency’s experts working on the flood defence plans for York spoke to councillors in York on Wednesday night, and said that while speeding up the flow of water through the Foss could stop some streets flooding, the costs of trying something similar on the much larger Ouse would far outweigh any benefits.

The EA is currently drawing up plans for the £45million promised by the government to improve flood defences in York.

The York project leader Tony Andryszewski told councillors that checks done just before the floods showed that 80 percent of flood defences in York were not up to the standard they should have been.

He also said the plans they were drawing up should make the defences strong enough to stop all but a one in 100-year flood, taking into account climate change and the bigger flows of water York’s rivers see. They could involve “demountable” defences that can be put in place when predictions show flood waters are on their way, but would be much stronger than sandbag walls.

He and fellow EA engineer Ben Hughes told Cllr Tony Hughes that, although they would consider a variable height weir at Naburn - like one that has recently been installed in Leeds, the amount of water that flows down the Ouse when it is in flood would soon mean any benefit gained from lowering the weir to get water out of York would be wiped out.

At the same time, they are looking at upstream measures to slow the flow of water coming into York, they added.

More detailed plans for York flood defences will go on show to the public in November, they said. Mr Andryszewski also said the EA needed to restore the confidence of residents and businesses that they would not face more flooding as another winter approaches.