I have my home near a new subdivision that is being installed. I am on well water and have a septic system. A company is planning on drilling holes for groundwater in the area and obviously digging the ground up for foundations for all the new homes. Can someone please tell me if all this digging and drilling can have an adverse affect on my well which is about 200 feet from all the digging that is going to take place.
If so, what can happen to my water from others digging and drilling so close?
Is there anything I can do to stop it or protect myself from the big companies that dig nearby?
It's pretty tough to stop progress. I'm sure these folks have all the necessary permits to do whatever they're doing. If , for instance your well stopped producing as a result of something they did, and you can prove it, you probably can have something done to have it fixed
I wouldn't worry about the basements -- they're surface scratching unrelated to the aquifer.
I don't know what you mean by "drilling holes for groundwater in the area". Are all the houses in the new subdivision going to be on individual wells or are they planning on drilling a community well or...??? Either of those could adversely impact your reservoir although only a trained hydrologist or other person who knows the local aquifer can tell you a priori. (As in, certainly no one on usenet w/o knowing a thing about even where you are can say anything meaningful about impacts.)
What you can do depends on where you are and what the rules are on established residential groundwater rights. (Here, it's essentially "first come, first served" for agricultural rights and basically nothing for residential.)
Another poster says he's sure the "whoevers" are in compliance and while that may be so, it isn't always necessarily so. The better the reputation of the developer, the more likely to follow rules, of course. Also, there may or may not be any zoning or other regulation in the area as of yet, anyway. You need to check w/ whatever jurisdiction controls sewage and find out who, if anybody, regulates wells.
Sooner would be better than later. As the same poster says, redress _may_ be possible if damage is done, but proving it could be difficult at best and expensive. Far better to be as proactive as possible at least w/ determining what's going on and "who's in charge"...
May or may not. No one can say for sure, but it is unlikely. If they do cause damage, they may have some responsibility to fix it.
If they happen to his the same veine of water, if they are up stream, you may get some crud in the water until it settles. As for digging the foundations, tha tis not a worry. They wont' be deep enough to affect you.
You can protest, you can lay down in the street to block the equipment you can carry a picket sign, you can pay your life savings to a lawyer. End result will be about the same. Look on the positive side. Most builders don't want to aggravate the neighbors and will go out of their way to avoid problems. Some will even help you. When they build a house across the street, they took down some trees and gave me the wood for my stove. Even hauled it over. They wanted to check where the sewer line went so asked to use my cleanout. They notice a trickle from a leaking toilet so they fixed it for me. I had a depression in my lawn so they filled it in for me.
It will have the same effect on your well that yours when you drilled it. Ask the people that in your area before you what effect your well and your house had on them.
Same effect yours had on the existing ones in the area.
You could buy up all the properties around you and keep them just as they are now.
It definitely can affect ground water. You should contact your City Council. Where I live, the builders are required to have an environmental study before they can modify the surface here, let alone dig a basement. one lady house has begin to sink more due to local parking lot install and change in ground water absorption.
Of course where $$$ is concerned, 'studies' don't mean much... City counsil is supposed to work for the people. Get some neighbors together and give them a piece of your mind. Maybe you don't win this one, but if they are messing with you now, don't expect them to stop...
We don't know for sure there were any (at least close) neighbors before. The incremental effect of one additional residential well as opposed to the addition of a fairly large number of individual or a few larger, communal wells isn't necessarily the same. Again, all depends on what is actually happening and what the local aquifer characteristics are...
I'll agree it isn't too likely the OP will have a problem, but if it were I, I'd be doing some investigating, too...
And, of course, if had the opportunity would have tried to buy up the area, too, although sounds too late now.
I am probably projecting.... I have been working on a project in a neighborhood where everyone is very concerned about every little thing that you do.
Agreed, but at what point do you get to tell your neighbors that own the land around you (whether they be individuals or a corporation) that there is enough development and they have to stop using their property because it may have an effect on you? One does not have the right to do that. Every bit of development affects neighboring properties in some way.
My problem with the OP is that as long as the proper procedures are followed, there isn't anything that they can do to stop progress. I would hate to have someone try to tell me what I can do on my property (or especially what I can't do). That is why I live out in the country.
I wish I could buy up all the property around me, but I can't afford to pay all the taxes just to be able to keep progress at bay.
My apologies to the OP,... you kind of struck a nerve with me when I was at a weak moment.
So if you owned a piece of property and someone told you that you can't develope it, you would be fine with that? When did development become "messing with" owners of adjacent property? They are just trying to use their property as they see fit.
What you are saying is this: You can own all the land you want around me, you just can't do anything with it.
It's a tough balancing act -- what about the folks coming out into farming country and buying a small acreage and building their "dream home" next to an existing animal operation (say a dairy or small feedlot or hog operation) and then demanding they cease or attempt to place completely ridiculous restrictions on the operations? Even more absurd than those in a situation similar to OP's in my opinion, but quite common and getting more so. :(
Dumb but honest question- isn't there a max number of wells 'n' septics per square mile, before the board of health folks force city water and/or sewer? (Variable depending on local soil characteristics and water tables and subsurface flow patterns, of course.) Or do they let things ride until water samples start failing e.coli tests and people start getting sick, or the wells run dry?
Depends totally on locality in me experience. Until quite recently here, there was no zoning of any kind nor even enforced health ordinances in the county outside of incorporated cities in the more rural/agrarian counties. It had never been an issue until quite recently. Now there is at least a modicum of control.
As noted before, as for drilling residential wells there are no limitations that I am aware of other than the separation from septic fields from the health standpoint. There is a "closed" area for further agricultural or industrial wells, however.
I suspect like most related questions the closer to metro areas one gets, the more restrictions/limitations one will find is a quite general rule...
Given some of the things I've seen happen around rural areas and smaller, established subdivisions, I'm not at all surprised nor do I blame them for being concerned. Wichita City just went an bought most of a quarter directly across a county road from a very nice area of existing acreages/houses with the expressed intent of placing a landfill there -- hardly conducive to making friends. Another area just got told there's now going to be a large development of subsidized housing go in what is presently a city park in the middle of what has been for 40+ years single-family or duplex residential. And, yet another residential area edge has been sold out to allow yet another WalMart SuperCenter with it's main parking lot entrance sharing the one entrance/egress street to their neighborhood which is landlocked and can't be provided a second egress w/o taking out multiple homes. To top this one off, there's an existing WM within 3 miles...
One doesn't have an absolute right to say how adjoining property is used, granted. But, otoh, while the adjoining landowner/developer may have the legal right by law to do something, doesn't necessarily make it right from a more neighborly point of view for lack of better way to put it. To make a nuisance for existing neighbors of whatever type is not an optimal answer, either.
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You're undoubtedly much more reasonable than some individuals and certainly some developers aren't at all concerned about effects on those surrounding them. It would be ideal if zoning and other ordinances were able to be totally fair to all involved but, unfortunately, like most other issues, "right" is colored mightily by the point of view.
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And that's why I have an option on the half-section north of the house so that when the current owner decides to sell I can prevent the feedlot east from acquiring it and moving their operation directly across the road. Fortunately, as agricultural land, it is revenue- generating even though I don't need it for our operation I'll add it to ensure the integrity of the surrounding area around the home quarter (which is three of the four quarters on the section).
Im not saying it, its our system. There are zoning rules that govern what you can and can not do with your land. In general, if he has a home, what other home owners do to their land will not affect him much. But when you mix zones, then businesses can do things home owners dont like, and vice versa. This is no different.
It happened in my neighborhood. But thats because my city is silly and still has no city development plan, so its haphazard zoning...
I thought the OP was talking about a subdivision. Not a walmart or a hog farm.
I have an electrical substation across the street from my shop, which is behind my house. It is a good neighbor. It never says anything about what I do on my property. I like it.
If it ever harms me, I can sue it (or rather its owners). Otherwise, I live and let live. Since I live in the country, there isn't any zoning. Down the street, we have a bread distribution warehouse, a church, a plumbing supply warehouse and some sort of office building. The other direction has only homes, but they are putting in a large computer company building (they are very secretive about exactly what they are going to do there). It is about 300,000 sf. It is at the end of my county road about a mile away.
When it gets too crowded for me, or I don't like something, I can sell and move. Or I can just learn to live with it. After all, they don't tell me what I can do with my property and I don't tell them how to use theirs.
If I wanted that sort of thing, then I could live in an area like the neighborhood of my current construction project. It has one of those gestapo like neighborhood associations that has to approve the exterior colors, roofing material and color, entry locations, exterior selections, landscaping, amount of time you can park on the street, what you can park on the street, hours you can work, how long you can leave your garage door open (1/2 hour), what playground equipment can be visible from the street, what you can keep in your yard, etc.
They pretty much let you do what you want inside your house, but you have no leeway concerning the exterior.
You see, there is a place for just about everyone. You just have to find it.
I live in a rural subdivision in the county, and it does have zoning, permits, code enforcement, etc. Several neighbors complained to the planning commission about a new subdivision planned with smaller lots than the typical neigborhood lot, and the builder increased the lot size.
Some states, counties, & watersheds have rules governing septic system & well spacing. You need to ask about your local requirements; start at the county courthouse. If you don't know who to call, start with the County Clerk. Probably, your state has a website with the agency involved in health & water permits.
Unless you have a shallow well, you probably won't notice any problems. You could invest a small amount of $ by taking a water sample from your well now, then periodically (quarterly? annually?) and keeping track of the quality. If the wells and septic systems are properly installed, nothing should be able to affect your water supply. The soil acts as a filter, and the biological activity in the soil converts all of the sewage into bacteria & plants. The most drastic impact you should expect is lower capacity during extreme drought, if the water table drops due to excessive use.
One thing to watch is that the builders don't create any buried trash pits. Chemicals used during home construction (paints, thinners, pesticides, solvents, etc.) don't belong underground and can contaminate the groundwater. It could be years before anyone would see this in their wells.
If you have a karst geology in your area, you may have problems. This is when the limestone layer is immediately below the surface, and has many joints, caves, and solution cavities that permit free flow of water underground. You need a specialist to help you then, but you probably would already know about it. There are some other types of geological problems, but they are rare.
That means I have the right to shoot a deer that comes from your place to mine.
It also means that I can drill an oil or water or gas well on my place even if all the stuff I produce from that well is drained from your property.
What I cannot do is pour arsenic down my well where it pollutes yours.
I must say that there are now some water districts being formed that tend to restrict my right to capture the water so what was isn't necessarily what will be.
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