Residents suggest dredging the Aldingbourne Rife as floods batter Bognor Regis

Among the worst affected areas were the fields around Shripney Lane and the A259 and land around the Rowan Park Caravan Park and the Riverside Caravan Centre.

Government flood warnings have urged motorists to avoid roads must vulnerable to flooding, saying some routes – including Shripney Road itself – may be ‘impassable’.

Tesco’s car park has also been flooded. Although this is part of Arun District Council’s flood mitigation plan, it means residents cannot park outside the store.

"This has been going on for years now, and you only have to look at the Rife to know its’ overgrown because nobody actually dredges it anymore,” one Bognor Regis resident, Roger, said.

“If you go near the new bypass, both the fields over that way are flooded, I went up through Barnham on Friday and that was flooded, Pagham Road near Church Lane was knee-deep in water.”

Roger went on to say that plans for new homes in the area won’t do anything to help the issue, adding "Everyone around here is sick to death of new housing built on flood plains which are supposed to protect our homes.”

Calls to reinstate the annual dredging of the Aldingbourne Rife have been ongoing since the practice was stopped more than twenty years ago. Speaking to the House of Commons in 2014, Nick Gibb, the MP for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton, said it was a ‘mistake’ to stop the practice, citing the 350 homes flooded in June 2012. He has been approached for comment.

Keir Greenway (Con), a West Sussex County Councillor for Bersted, one of the areas worst affected by the flooding, said he had heard from a number of residents on the issue.

“A couple of residents have reached out to me about the dredging of the rife, and I’ve reached out to the Environment Agency and haven’t yet heard back on that.

"It’s a delicate issue at the end of the day. Fortunately, most of the flooding is taking place in the right places, rather than the wrong places. And it’s striking that balance where we’re not destroying the riverbed.

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Some roads in Bognor Regis could be 'impassable' as flood warnings continue in Bognor Regis