The DANA of October 29 has been the most catastrophic recorded in recent times in the Valencian Community, but it has not been the only one in a land that constantly lives under the sword of Damocles of the cold drop and storms. Valencian history is full of cases of catastrophes generated by rain and, in recent decades, there are examples of how life has adapted and made its way.
The most drastic examples occurred after what was known as swamp de Tous, the failure of the dam located in this town on October 20, 1982 caused by an explosive cold drop and which caused the flooding of thirty municipalities on the banks of the Júcar, with levels that in some towns reached up to 8 meters. The swamp It almost immediately flooded the towns closest to the reservoir, Sumacàrcer, Gavarda and Beneixida, the latter two were affected in such a way that most of their houses had to be rebuilt. But it was decided to build them in other, higher locations close to the old original nuclei.
The decision was made by the Council of Ministers in 1984 when it approved a sum of 380 million of the old pesetas (2.3 million euros and equivalent to about 9 million, currently), in collaboration with the then incipient Generalitat Valenciana as an investment to build the new municipalities. In the case of Beneixida, the relocation was complete, and now the town, located 13 kilometers away and inhabited again since the early nineties, is a nucleus of about 650 residents, which has a perfect orthogonal plan, a testament to its modernity. Very similar is the case of Gavarda, now with just over 1,000 residents, which was relocated to a hill, but still maintains about 70 inhabitants in its old, highest nucleus that was partially saved. Currently, ghost towns remain in their previous locations, street layouts and churches in perfect condition, witnesses with marks of the level where the height of the water reached.
Decades later, the DANA of 2019 arrived, and one of the most affected towns was Ontinyent, a municipality located at the foot of the Clariano River, and which at that time flooded again permanently – with a rainfall of 400 liters per square meter. – the Canteriaria neighborhood. That episode gave way to the municipal, regional and state authorities once again choosing to relocate the inhabitants, this time on a smaller scale, but which is considered a European example of reducing the environmental impact in cities with a solution to eliminate housing risk.
This intervention has involved the demolition of a large part of the houses in the area, compensation to its neighbors for their relocation, and the construction of a flood park. Until now, it has received a total investment of 7 million euros contributed by the Ontinyent City Council itself, the Generalitat, the central government and the European Union.
Rethink urban planning
That water reclaims the place that has historically been its own is nothing new on the Mediterranean coast. It happened last week and it is normal for it to happen again. This is how María Jesús Romero, Full Professor of the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV) of the Department of Urban Planning in the Area of Administrative Law, understands it.
Romero explains that a problem that has been suffered with this and other DANAs has been the caused anthropic change, that is, the change made by human beings in the environment. This aggravates the risks of flooding, because it aggravates the consequences by building infrastructure or urbanizing in flood-prone areas that can create a dam effect, and that “when the water overcomes these obstacles it returns with greater force.”
The urban planning expert explains that there are tools such as the Patricova (Territorial Action Plan on Flood Risk Prevention in the Valencian Community), a plan approved in 2003 and reviewed and updated in 2015. This plan presented structural measures against flood risks. such as channels, motes or drainage channels, and other non-structural ones such as land use planning. This plan, in addition, is the guide that delimits the Urban Planning Plans of the municipalities.
But the Patricova has an essential drawback: it is not retroactive with respect to 2003, when it was initially approved, so urban planning does not include intervention in consolidated urban areas, and as Romero warns, there are some municipalities that are entire in potentially floodable areas. , according to risk levels. On the other hand, municipal urban planning plans also have the problem that they are updated infrequently, and when they are, “some do so with a process that lasts 15 years, if they are lucky,” laments the UPV professor. Furthermore, he warns, “in some municipalities they cheat to be able to build in non-recommended areas and that not everyone is diligent when it comes to having active emergency plans in the face of these risks.”
Solutions? Like Patricova, Romero points to two directions: the structural and the urban. Regarding inhabited areas, he admits that “it is very difficult and very expensive, you cannot erase towns with thousands of inhabitants like Paiporta with a stroke of a pen, this is not the case with Gavarda and Beneixida. But more surgical actions are necessary, at least in those areas with the highest risk of flooding.” All of this should be accompanied by pedagogy regarding the population and public leaders, raising awareness of the risks, knowing how to act in the face of alerts and not letting them be understood as an obstacle to building freely anywhere.
Regarding infrastructure, he also points out that they are very necessary. He gives as an example the Plan Sur de València, the project to divert the channel of the Turia River to the south of the city after the flood that flooded the capital in 1957, when it passed through the urban center. “The regulations must be amplified, they should be adapted to the current climatic circumstances,” which is why he is committed to the execution of new infrastructures that relieve the flow of the Turia River in the event of possible floods. “Now the new channel is prepared to take on up to 5,000 cubic meters per second, but in the 1957 flood the flood reached 6,000 cubic meters.” And, he explains, “the plan contained other works that were not executed; Now the new Turia channel has been tested and has held up, but we are still at risk.”
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