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© Lower Otter Restoration Project
Queen’s Green Canopy
The Environment Agency, on behalf of the Lower Otter Restoration Project, has been granted a virtual plaque after planting 225 trees to form part of the Queen’s Green Canopy which marked the 2022 Platinum Jubilee.
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2 January 2024: After a fascinating journey over the past few years, we are pleased to be able to say that the construction phase of the pioneering Lower Otter Restoration Project is now complete.
As a result, this website will no longer be updated, but it is our intention that it should remain available online as a publicly available source of information until the end of 2024.
To comply with data protection legislation, the project mailing list is being deleted as no fresh updates will be issued by this route.
The Lower Otter is now being managed by the Pebblebed Heaths Conservation Trust and you can sign up for their newsletters here.
You can still email the project team and your message will be passed to the most relevant team member for a response.
On behalf of the whole team we would like to thank all those partners and members of the public who have supported us in this challenging and important project which has led to the creation of 55ha of fantastic intertidal habitat, benefiting wildlife and the community.
Residents celebrate opening of the 'Elizabeth Bridge'
24 November 2023: The brand new 70m "Elizabeth Bridge" has been officially opened by Hon. Charles Fane Trefusis and Mark Rice, Environment Agency Area Director, marking a significant milestone for the project.
Click here to read more.
Latest updates
Q&A
Answers to the most frequently asked questions about the project are available here.
Environment
Environmental Statement
To see the Lower Otter Restoration Project Environmental Statement, click here.
Planning application -
The need to create intertidal habitat is to compensate for losses identified in the Exe Estuary Flood and Coastal Erosion Risk Management Strategy (the Strategy) (approved in September 2014).
The Exe Estuary is a Special Protection Area, designated under the European Union (EU) Birds Directive and an internationally-
Maintaining and improving existing flood defences, will result in the loss of European designated intertidal habitat caused by coastal squeeze (the loss of existing intertidal habitat in front of defences as a result of rising sea levels that drown out the habitat).
This will adversely affect the integrity of the Dawlish Warren Special Area of Conservation and Exe Estuary Special Protection Area and Ramsar site. Under the Habitats Regulations, it is therefore a statutory requirement for the Environment Agency to create habitat to compensate for that lost.
Through the development of the Strategy several potential sites within the Exe Estuary were considered for compensatory habitat creation. From these a short list of sites was created, including on the Rivers Clyst and Kenn. Detailed investigations between 2013 and 2015 concluded that habitat creation at the Clyst and Kenn sites would not be feasible, and that there were no other suitable sites in the Exe Estuary.
The Otter Estuary was identified as a potential site, suitable for creating compensatory habitat and the principle agreed with Natural England. An agreement between the Environment Agency and the Estate, the landowner, was established as the objectives of the Estate for the Otter estuary aligned wholly with those of the Strategy.
Next -
Dawlish Warren
Options considered
The preferred options for LORP were identified through a staged approach, by:
Developing a wide range of options – a long list of options including do nothing, do minimum and eight other options including creating a freshwater reservoir to a range of restoration options of the Otter floodplain;
Screening out options considered to be technically, environmentally or economically unviable; and
Developing the short list of options:
1. Full Scale Restoration;
2. Assisted Natural Recovery;
3. Big and Little Marsh Floodplain Restoration; and
4. Big Marsh South Floodplain Restoration.
The options appraisal concluded that the preferred option for the Scheme was short list Option 3 Big and Little Marsh Floodplain Restoration.
Consultation
There was a high level of stakeholder consultation, public engagement, professional advice and consultative work throughout the design of the Scheme.
A Stakeholder Group was set up, providing an interface between the project team and interested parties, including community representatives, and was involved in the development of the short list of options.
Project stakeholder group meetings and several public consultations were held locally at community centres and at parish and town council meetings. These were held to highlight the issues, understand stakeholder and public perceptions of the problems, assess their reaction to outline proposals and options, gather information on alternative strategies and to ensure the local community had a chance to help shape the broad form of the project.
Since 2015 an essential component of the Scheme’s communications work has been through this website. This places key documents in the public domain, including the project’s rationale and vision, minutes of the Stakeholder Group meetings, the Risk Register, factsheets and frequently asked questions and proposed timelines. It also advertised key engagement events, with outcomes from public consultation available for viewing.
A long list of options was discussed with specialists from the Environment Agency and the Estate on 7th March 2017, and with the Stakeholder Group on 15th March 2017. With the exception of the Granary Lane residents group, the main stakeholder groups gave their conditional or tentative support for floodplain restoration through managed realignment.
From here, a short list of options was developed, and a public exhibition was held on 5th July 2017.
The exhibition was attended by 144 people and 105 feedback forms were received, which helped inform the outline design of the scheme. 73% of responders were supportive of LORP objectives and 62% were most in favour of the option that has become the preferred option.
Going forward, in addition to the project website, the East Devon Pebblebed Heaths Conservation Trust (EDPHCT), the Estate and Environment Agency Facebook, Twitter and YouTube accounts are being used to provide regular updates about the project.
