Severn Trent closed the water treatment works with the commissioning of the Mythe Treatment Works on the river Severn , and the reservoir itself became a flood storage reservoir for the River Chelt in an attempt to protect the town of Cheltenham from flooding from the east . The town nonetheless suffered flooding in the July 2007 floods though this was not only from the river Chelt at Dowdeswell , but from all the streams which join the Chelt within the town and its outskirts . The Dowdeswell ' balancing pond ' only deals with the Chelt ( really a stream at this point in its life ) , Dowdeswell stream and runoff from the limestone scarp
July 2007 floods
2007 United Kingdom floods
Dowdeswell Reservoir