Piping and filling drainage ditch

[Vortice]

I haven't made enquiries with the authorities yet. Before I do, I'd like to ask if anyone has any suggestions for how I might achieve this.

We have recently moved house. At the end of the garden is a drainage ditch with a very unkept hedge on the other side of it. Dead foliage falls into the ditch along with rotting fruit from fruit trees. The hedge belongs to the neighbours. As well as being a maintenance burden, it is unsightly and the stagnant water attracts mosquitoes. Ideally, I'd like to pipe it and fill it in.

Immediately upstream is a vehicle access for the neighbours, so the open ditch is piped under the road access. The water enters my ditch here in the form of two perforated 3" pipes. Downstream, the water leaves the ditch and re-enters the neighbour's property through a 6" pipe. I don't know for certain but I don't think this pipe is perforated. Their ditch was piped and filled about 15 years ago.

The ditch is 100' long, 2' deep, falling to 3'. It is 1' wide at the bottom and 4'-5' at the top. In the summer its dry and in the winter it can have 1" to 6" of water in it. After sustained heavy rainfall all of the drainage ditches round here are pretty full and it takes a few days for the local river to drop and allow the ditches to drain.

I suspect that it's not just a case of connecting the upstream and downstream pipes as there is probably additional land drainage into the ditch. However if I use perforated pipe and gravel I am concerned that it won't hold as much water as at present and therefore flood our garden.

Does anyone have any thoughts on how I could pipe and fill successfully?

Thanks,

John

[Dave_L]

Throw a 225 pipe in the ditch, couple up and backfill! I wouldn't use a perf land drain pipe

[Vortice]

As simple as that Dave? I must admit that I thought of doing that and leaving the ditch open over next winter to see what the impact will be.

Thanks for the reply.