THE highest river levels are expected in the Oxford area this morning, the Environment Agency said last night.

Last night the Met Office forecast a dry but cold night with temperatures dipping to 3C and a yellow warning of ice was issued for this morning.

Light rain is forecast for tonight and it is expected to remain dry tomorrow.

There were 16 flood warnings in place last night and two of the main routes in Oxford, Abingdon Road and Botley Road, remained closed.

An Environment Agency spokesman told the Oxford Mail: “The Met Office is forecasting light showers and drier weather into the weekend. With no change in the weather forecast the highest river levels are expected in the Oxford area by Friday morning.”

Thames Water said it got calls to a “staggering” 700 jobs on Monday and at its peak was completing one job a minute.

A spokesman said its customer contact centre got more than four times its usual numbers of calls about its waste network.

Ian Cain, Thames Water’s customer service director, said: “We sympathise deeply with those suffering from flooding, and our teams are working tremendously hard to deal with flooding reports as soon as we can.”