Drainage Pipe Liability

Where my house is sitauted, we are on the lower face of a hillside. Running behind our street is another parallel street. In the garden of the house on the upper side of the street behind there is a natural spring which runs into a pond in their garden. This pond has a drain pipe in it, which appears to pass under the road, (heading downhill) then continues in pretty much a straight line downhill which takes it through the garden of the house which backs onto mine, and then through my property from back to front, passing under one side of my house. We have had problems with underground breakage to this pipe, which was repaired by my insurers under accidental damage cover. However this has not cured the proplem of my garden becoming absolutely waterlogged, with the water running off the garden. The soil is thick clay as far down as I have dug, (approx 4 -5 feet). Various camera surveys etc have shown the pipe is not collapsed, but is not watertight, it is a 7" clay pipe. As the garden is above the groundlevel of the house, I am very concerned that this water will be damaging my foundations etc, as the water must try and travel downhill, (ie where my house is). This pipe was not mentioned when we bought (2 years ago) although the previous owner must have known of its existence as he built an extension over the pipe and would have unearthed it at some point, and does not seem to appear on any drawings the council have. If the pipe needs replacing / repairing, is there any liabilty to the people to whom the pipe serves, specifically the house with the spring, or would the council/water authority have any responsiblity. This pipe is not utilised by me at all, it simply passes under my land, although it is causing me great problems at present, and an estimated bill of thousands to repair or replace it.

Reply to
Andy
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This is a natural burn or spring, so it comes under the liability of your local water board. They have liability to make sure that the burn is not a nuisance to surrounding property, so they are liable to have it repaired properly.

It should be an easy job for them, what with new technology giving them the opportunity to have a plastic liner that lasts for a guaranteed minimum of

25 years, or so the makers claims would have it.

You need to contact your local water company for this one.

Reply to
BigWallop

Interesting you should say this, as I cannot get any help from the water authorities, they only seem to say 'Its not a supply pipe, not our problem'. The local council "Wealden District" have more or less told me it is a private land drain, and therefore the responsibilty of whoevers land it is under. Therefore with the leak in my garden, my problem.

Just had a report in from the last camera survey. When they managed to bung the incoming pipe at the boundary or my property, they could do a camera survey throughout the pipe run under my property with no water flow in the pipe. This survey showed that whilst the piep appears sound, there is in places water 'spurting' into the pipe from the surrounding soil. I am no expert in these matters, but would this indicate that the ground water may not actually be coming from the pipe, but from another source. My limited physics tells me if the water is going to take the path of least resistance, then straight down the inside of the pipe would be easier than out through the holes where ground water is spurting in, especially if the external ground water is under sufficient pressure in the first place to spurt in to the pipe. When there is water flow in the pipe, it only ever appears to reach 1" or 2" depth in the bottom of this pipe.

Reply to
Andy

If the land is owned privately, then it is the responsiblitiy of the land owner (landlord) and not the local authority, so you might be stuck with its repair if you've taken full deed for this part of the land.

The water coming in to pipe might really be a neccesary principle of this particular pipework, as your last explanation makes it sounds more as though it could be a proper field drainage system.

A field drain is a pipe with holes along its length to allow water to seep in and run off safely and prevent flooding. This pipe might actually need new gravel back-fill around it because the holes are bunged up with soil and other debris, which is more likely to be the cause of your problems. Lining it fully will only make the localised flooding worse.

Ask your landlord for the plans of the drainage in the area, and if they say that they don't have them and the local coucil do, then the problem lies with the local council to fix it. if the landlord does have the plans, then take a look at the field drainage system and determine where the outflow of the pipe goes and tackle it backwards from there.

The field drain principle is simple. It works by placing a perforated pipe in the ground surrounded by large stones which stop small bits of debris from getting through, but it lets water through and stops it lying on the surface of the ground and running into the property. A good field drain system is made up of multiple pipes laid in a straight line grid just above the natural water table of the surrounding land. When done properly it keeps the water level well below the surface and allows it to drain off quicker than the natural lie of the land would do.

So check with your landlord and the local authority first to see which of them holds deed to the land and the drainage therein.

Good luck with it.

Reply to
BigWallop

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