Details of town's £100m water plan revealed

Details of a major plan to upgrade water and wastewater networks in a coastal town have been revealed.

Southern Water's proposals for Hastings, which are expected to cost more than £100m, follow a series of floods, outages and concerns over sewage spills.

The plans include action to reduce flooding risks in the town centre, improve the water supply network's resilience and upgrade how Southern Water manages wastewater in the town, including by cutting storm overflows.

Tim McMahon, Southern Water's managing director, said: "We recognise that our performance in the Hastings area must improve, and we are committing to investing and upgrading across the board to get there."

Plans also include the refurbishment of reservoir pumps and valves at Southern Water's Darwell site, upgrades to the main water supply pipe which connects it to Brede, construction of a new reservoir at Newgate and installation of 15.5 miles (25km) of new water mains.

There could also be refurbishment of 500 metres (1,640ft) of sewers in the area, upgrades at the Rock-A-Nore and Galley Hill pumping stations and actions to better manage surface water challenges at Alexandra Park.

Southern Water said the plans were developed after speaking to the community.

Mr McMahon said he was confident the action plan would live up to local customers' expectations.

Despite this, resident Jane Cole said she was sceptical about the investment.

"Lets wait and see what happens," she said.

But local sea swimmer Ruth Wilson thought the investment was "brilliant".

She said it was time for investment to be put into Hastings' water network amid anger surrounding the town's issues.

In May, a burst water main caused over 32,000 properties to lose their water supply for the large majority of the bank holiday weekend.

There was also heavy flooding in October 2023, which caused the evacuation of the town's shopping centre.

The plan will be formally presented to Hastings Borough Council on Monday, but the full extent of the investment will be dependent on Ofwat’s decision on Southern Water's 2025-30 business plan, which is set to be made later in 2024.

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