Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2007 11:48 am
At the end of our garden is a non-adopted, unpaved, single-track sandy lane that runs between the houses in our road and a parallel road. The ground slopes gently down from the parallel road to ours.
We have a double garage that opens onto the lane, with a concrete hard-standing. At this point, the lane seems to be lower than it is for the adjacent properties, and it is also higher than our hand-standing. As a result, when it rains, we get a lot of muddy water run-off from the lane onto our hard-standing and under the garage doors; typically half the garage will be under water. The adjacent properties do not suffer from any of this.
The water eventually evaporates, leaving behind mud / soil.
The garage stretches across the entire property "frontage" bar about three feet one side (half of a shared concreted path, which also gets muddy) and two feet the other (unpaved). The garden is about 100 feet long. We have an unshared inspection pit beside the house into which soil, waste and rainwater pipes all feed, but I doubt Thames Water would appreciate us channelling lots of water into it, even if we precipitated the soil out first.
A soakaway under the hard-standing would, I feel sure, all too soon become blocked by the fine soil particles in the run-off. A simple concrete hump inside the doors would keep the garage dry, but the hard-standing would still get covered in mud (and the wooden doors would stand in water whenever it rained). A retaining wall of sufficient height between hard-standing and lane would make using the garage impossible without moveable ramps.
I don't expect anyone here to solve this just from my description - although I'd be delighted if anyone could - so my question is: what Yellow Pages category / Google search string would lead me to the type of expert that I need to propose possible solutions to our problem. I can find plenty of people who'll put in drainage for me, but I want someone who'll be able to tell me what my options are, and the up- and down-sides of them.
ATB
Keith
We have a double garage that opens onto the lane, with a concrete hard-standing. At this point, the lane seems to be lower than it is for the adjacent properties, and it is also higher than our hand-standing. As a result, when it rains, we get a lot of muddy water run-off from the lane onto our hard-standing and under the garage doors; typically half the garage will be under water. The adjacent properties do not suffer from any of this.
The water eventually evaporates, leaving behind mud / soil.
The garage stretches across the entire property "frontage" bar about three feet one side (half of a shared concreted path, which also gets muddy) and two feet the other (unpaved). The garden is about 100 feet long. We have an unshared inspection pit beside the house into which soil, waste and rainwater pipes all feed, but I doubt Thames Water would appreciate us channelling lots of water into it, even if we precipitated the soil out first.
A soakaway under the hard-standing would, I feel sure, all too soon become blocked by the fine soil particles in the run-off. A simple concrete hump inside the doors would keep the garage dry, but the hard-standing would still get covered in mud (and the wooden doors would stand in water whenever it rained). A retaining wall of sufficient height between hard-standing and lane would make using the garage impossible without moveable ramps.
I don't expect anyone here to solve this just from my description - although I'd be delighted if anyone could - so my question is: what Yellow Pages category / Google search string would lead me to the type of expert that I need to propose possible solutions to our problem. I can find plenty of people who'll put in drainage for me, but I want someone who'll be able to tell me what my options are, and the up- and down-sides of them.
ATB
Keith
