A HIGHWAYS chief has praised staff at a city hotel for supporting him and his workers during the flood effort.

Worcestershire County Council’s highways manager Jon Fraser said: “During the flooding last week we had many work teams working throughout the night to ensure things kept running as smoothly as possible.

“This included setting up the contraflow, closing New Road, Hylton Road and running the shuttle bus.”

Mr Fraser visited the Premier Inn this week to present its manager Jo Brace with a thank you letter and some flowers to say thanks for their support.

He said: “The staff and particularly the manager, Jo Brace from the Premier Inn went above and beyond to accommodate us whilst we worked.

“They were really, really helpful, bringing us hot drinks and allowing us to use the toilets 24 hours a day. They even let me jump on the wi-fi so I could update twitter on all that was happening with the road closures.

“They went above and beyond for us so I popped in to the Premier Inn to present Jo with some gifts just to make sure she knew how much we appreciated her help.

“She was delighted and quite surprised! It was only right to reward her and the staff for all their efforts .”

The river levels have begun to rise again yesterday and a yellow flood alert, meaning be aware, is now in force on the River Severn.

According to the Flood information service river levels are beginning to rise at the Bewdley river gauge as a result of heavy rainfall. Consequently, flooding of roads and farmland is expected between 3am and 9am today.

Flooding is expected to affect low lying land and roads adjacent to the river.

Predicted river peaks include Bewdley 3.4m to 3.7m Friday morning, Worcester 4.3m to 4.6m Friday afternoon and Diglis 3.6 to 3.9m Friday evening.

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Further rainfall is forecast over the next 24 hours. We expect river levels to remain high until March 15.

Mr Fraser added: “We will be working with our friends at the Environment Agency as the river levels are set to rise once again.

“We do not expect it to be as high as it was last month, but we will monitor the situation and remain vigilant.”