Kent County Council is to come to the rescue of residents who are frustrated by the permanent flooding of a riverside footpath.

Last month, Alan Newman, the chairman of the Clifford Way Residents Association went public with his frustration after trying for three years to get somebody to sort out a flooded footpath at the foot of Unicumes Lane in Fant.

A stretch of around 100 metres of the towpath has been consistently flooding because of water overflowing from a pond farther up Unicumes Lane.

But now KCC engineer Emma Burdett has visited the site. She said: “I can see that the pond is overflowing and it appears that there may be a blockage in the pipe from the pond to the Southern Water surface water sewer.”

She said she would attempt to identify the land-owner, whose responsibility it was to deal with the issue, but in the meantime, KCC would jet the pipe and clear some of the silt from the pond which should hopefully stop the flooding.

However, she warned: “If the problem turns out to be not with the overflow, but within the surface water sewer, then we will need to pass this over to Southern Water to action. We won’t know that until we can get a machine out there.”

She is hoping to have the task completed in October, to avoid the danger of people slipping on ice once the winter approaches.

Mr Newman said: “This is certainly encouraging news.”