help needed for garden

Blimey , what a can of worms ????
I think I would check out if the drain pipes are soakaways .. Do you or the neighbours have any type of inspection chambers ?usually rain water are smaller covers than sewerage sometimes round sometimes square .I would be surprised if you have not drainage they normal have a ring drain running around the buildings which the down pipes connect into then have inspection chambers periodically.
Maybe if you cannot manage it you could get a neighbour to check ,if you find an inspection cover open it up then where your downpipe goes into the ground dig around and see if there is a slightly bigger pipe possibly with a rubber collar on .. you could then pour some water in and check if it shows in the inspection chamber.(you must be the flow side of the chamber )

Dave

However as others have said you should not have to do this it is the Housing Associations responsability,have they actually been and inspected the problem ?

 

hi thanks for all advise yes they have come and inspected the garden and several other gardens with the same problem they told us to do a french drain as they are not prepared to do anything we did appeal against this decision and was still told no its down to us. they said the aera has clay ground so it will always be a problem here . apparently this is the norm now to put soak aways in instead of connecting to the storm water its the water board that has requested that this is done in new builds now.
cannot dig around the drain pipes as they are concreted into the ground around the bottom

 

Thats quite right about the water boards, they can't handle the flooding so they are trying to put the responsibility onto other people. But if a soakaway,that they knew was in clay before they dug it, is not working then someone at the planning stage has cocked up & its not the tennants responsibility to correct planning mistakes.

Clay is porous and impermeable at the same time, that means it will hold water, but will effectively stop water passing though it at any usefull drainage level. It takes weeks if not months to dry out.

The planners should have known and considered this before anyone even picked up a trowel, let alone built a house there.

I live on a medium shrinkage clay, how do I know this ? Because I had to pay for soil analasis and building regs approval with regard to drainage before I even started this conversion.

Do not let them tell you its your problem for there **** ups.

Sorry, rant over, it just makes me mad what people try to get away with.

Next thing you know they will be building on flood plains & telling residents it their fault when the tide comes in.

 

Certainly a challange ...
The idea of the French drain is fine but it still really needs to take the water away as it will only have a very limited capacity. I know that the water board are trying to stop extra loads on there drainage, but if they have used soakaways there must be enough capacity ,ask if you could join into that pipe and see what they say ..
Ulternativly as Rob mentioned, get a builder or landscaper to have a look and see what they suggest , it is easier to address a major problem like this on site ..
Obviously this is not a great time to tackle this problem but you could plan for the early summer when things are drier..

Dave

 

yes you are right the building regs are soakaway shpuld be 5 meters away from the house which would put a soakaway at the highest point of my garden right at the top . planning told me when this house was built it would have been 3 meters but still fighting my corner with the housing association gone to the stage 2 of complaints so now waiting to see what they will say if they refuse we sit before a board and fight our case but I have now threaten to take it to odbudsman thinking of taking to enviromental heath as well contacted planning they said ha should make the repairs and not me so watch this space !!!!

 

Hi All,

Yes,we told to dig 4 soakaways for the downpipes, 5 metres away from the house. That would have meant siting them in the middle of the road though, don't think highways would have liked that.

 

Do you need permission to add drainage to the surface water waste pipes?
I dug drainage channels with perforated pipe all around my garage as it constantly flooded.
It worked a treat and some was left gravelled, some under patio and some under turf.
It was a lot of hard work but the end result was well worth it.
I put traps in to stop soil getting into the drain an pipes wrapped in the proper fabric.

It would have cost a fortune to get a builder in, I'm tight and like a challenge.

Give it a go.

 

I love doing drainage. Great excuse to hire a Boy's Toys digger for the weekend!

Although ... as time passes ... having to think of every more complex reasons WHY we need to hire a JCB for a week during the Summer

 

5 Meters!

 

well I have had a reply today and they are still saying they will do nothing and if I want I can contact a builder they also said that the nhbc only dealt in defects in the building structure only. they also said they are not responsible for garden drainage only drainage from the roof of the house but surely their drainage for the roof is causing more problems in the garden where their is no where for the water to run. have now sent them photos of the flooding and asked to take it to the 3 rd stage of complaints but the chap involved is not in untill thurday.