Flood Protecting My Own Home

SwingsitlikeHogan

SwingsitlikeHogan

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Sorting my mothers house prior to selling it - we decided to do something about the fact that her back garden and cellar were getting flooded very badly and regularly when rain was heavy. It never used to do this - certainly nowhere near as bad as it has been. One of the main reasons we think is that her two immediate 'uphill' neighbours had paved their drives with no apparent cross drainage - so rain water pouring down their drives to their back gardens and then downhill into my mum's garden - truly like a river. Her garden was flooding terribly and flooding into her cellar.

So we have build a couple of little low walls at the two points the water was flooding through from next door. This has largely solved our problem - but of course has exacerbated the backgarden flooding problems of mum's 'uphill' neighbours.

We feel sorry for our immediate neighbour as she has young children and they cannot use their garden much of the time - it is just too wet if not flooded. But we have only taken measures to protect mum's property.

Have we done anything wrong - morally or legally?

This is prompted by seeing a flooding rectification company at mum's neighbour yesterday.
 
It reads like the uphill neighbour caused the problem of flooding into your mums and the same uphill neighbour is now suffering because you've stopped that flood

Doesn't this just leave them with their 'own' water back again
 
SwingsitlikeHogan said:
Sorting my mothers house prior to selling it - we decided to do something about the fact that her back garden and cellar were getting flooded very badly and regularly when rain was heavy. It never used to do this - certainly nowhere near as bad as it has been. One of the main reasons we think is that her two immediate 'uphill' neighbours had paved their drives with no apparent cross drainage - so rain water pouring down their drives to their back gardens and then downhill into my mum's garden - truly like a river. Her garden was flooding terribly and flooding into her cellar.

So we have build a couple of little low walls at the two points the water was flooding through from next door. This has largely solved our problem - but of course has exacerbated the backgarden flooding problems of mum's 'uphill' neighbours.

We feel sorry for our immediate neighbour as she has young children and they cannot use their garden much of the time - it is just too wet if not flooded. But we have only taken measures to protect mum's property.

Have we done anything wrong - morally or legally?

This is prompted by seeing a flooding rectification company at mum's neighbour yesterday.
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Hell no! Oh and it's too late now, you've done it!
 
Slab said:
It reads like the uphill neighbour caused the problem of flooding into your mums and the same uphill neighbour is now suffering because you've stopped that flood

Doesn't this just leave them with their 'own' water back again
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The immediate uphill neighbour has only been in the house a few years and the monoblocking of her drive and her own uphill neighbours drive had been done before she moved in. Her garden had been flooding - but nothing like mum's - and of course now that we have put in the two little walls it is much worse - there is nowhere for her water and her neighbours water to go.

I'm thinking she could herself just build a little wall her side of her boundary with her own uphill neighbours - and maybe put in a pump for the water coming down her own drive into her garden...but that's not our problem. I was just feeling guilty and wondering if we'd done anything we legally shouldn't have - as we have exacerbated her problem.
 
SwingsitlikeHogan said:
The immediate uphill neighbour has only been in the house a few years and the monoblocking of her drive and her own uphill neighbours drive had been done before she moved in. Her garden had been flooding - but nothing like mum's - and of course now that we have put in the two little walls it is much worse - there is nowhere for her water and her neighbours water to go.

I'm thinking she could herself just build a little wall her side of her boundary with her own uphill neighbours - and maybe put in a pump for the water coming down her own drive into her garden...but that's not our problem. I was just feeling guilty and wondering if we'd done anything we legally shouldn't have - as we have exacerbated her problem.
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All depends where you were standing when the wall was built really, some brickies don't like anyone in their eyeline or hidden behind them making random noises (HNSP I think they call it)

;)

Nah you've no moral guilt but I'm not a lawyer (or bricklayer) to say if you've done anything else wrong
 
Slab said:
All depends where you were standing when the wall was built really, some brickies don't like anyone in their eyeline or hidden behind them making random noises (HNSP I think they call it)

;)

Nah you've no moral guilt but I'm not a lawyer (or bricklayer) to say if you've done anything else wrong
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:) LOL
 
Certainly if the driveways were paved after 2005 then there would have been a requirement for building regulations consent. If this was not obtained then you can ask the council to take action to reverse what they have done. Admittedly, the work may be out of the normal enforcement period for lack of building regulations consent but it could be argued that an injunction should be applied for to enforce outside of the normal time as it is within the public interest (bearing in mind that it is causing flooding)
 
Thanks all. I think my brother did check with the council before building the little 'dams' - they are little concrete walls no more than 12" high and 18" wide, they just block the gaps where water from our neighbour was pouring through and flooding my mother's garden and cellar.

Previously the drives of our 'uphill' neighbours were red granite chippings on earth - as they had been since the houses were built. And guess what...the flooding has only got worse since both drives were monoblocked.
 
the obvious answer would be to put in a drainage channel and soakaway on the downhill side of each paved drive

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I put one in when I build our patio as it slopes towards the house, pretty straightforward job
 
Rooter said:
yeh, a soakaway like fragger mentioned!

http://www.diydoctor.org.uk/projects/soakaway-water-drainage-system.htm
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I guess that's what my mum's neighbour will do - when monoblocked no cross-drains were included - and I suspect none in two up either. And maybe mum's neighbour just builds a foot high wall the length of her garden between herself and her neighbour. It's maybe 50ft. Shouldn't be too expensive I'd hope for our neighbour. The drives are fairly long and slope steeply from the road down to the back gardens.

My dad concreted and slabbed ours - and included regular cross-channels straight into side drains - and guess what - we don't have flooding from our drive into our garden.
 
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