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Flooding: Best Laid Plans?

Winter storms have caused serious disruption on the railways, roads and airports. How well prepared is Britain's transport infrastructure to cope with the worst of the weather?

Flights grounded. Trains cancelled. Roads flooded. It's becoming a familiar story every winter as Britain's transport systems are battered by the weather. While rainfall this winter has been unusually high, has some of the disruption that we've seen been caused by a lack of strategic planning and routine maintenance? Should a flooded river have been able to knock out power supplies at Gatwick, catching airport authorities by surprise? Were the drainage systems adequate on some of the railway embankments that collapsed, leaving passengers stranded? Allan Urry investigates why our infrastructure is struggling to cope with the storms and asks whether bad planning has made a bad situation worse?

Producer: Rob Cave.

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38 minutes

Last on

Sun 16 Feb 2014 17:00

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Winter storms have caused serious disruption on the railways, roads and airports. How well prepared is Britain's transport infrastructure to cope with the worst of the weather?

Broadcasts

  • Tue 11 Feb 2014 20:00
  • Sun 16 Feb 2014 17:00

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