Hey All,
So my wife and I have been fighting our City about a drainage issue on our property. There is no easement, the pipe is 60’ long but the City claims their portion of it ends at the right of way. Anyway, I need to stop the pummeling of the entire streets water hitting my septic infiltrators.
Is there a way to cap it? I just need to mitigate the damage this is causing. And because nothing is easy in my life, it’s not easy access either. What can I do here outside of ripping out this 60 foot behemoth?
*We’ve been in the legal portion of it for a while now because the local courts shut down due to COVID 19 and case scheduling has been postponed until recently.
Joe
I’m not understanding what you’re up against. Is it an open ended culvert or something? Do you have any pictures? I enjoy brainstorming for fixes.
So the deal here is, this pipe used to drain 8 feet further behind me. These clowns from the city dug all of this up and now shoots water out here which is literally under a tree, next to a fence and next to my infiltrators. There’s about 1/2 mile of road water coming out of this (we’re at the bottom of the hill) so there’s a ton when it rains.
I would rent a ditch digger, splice on some new pipe, run it farther away, then use that receipt in my court case. Problem solved immediately and then you might be reimbursed.
Or a temp solution is to attach a plastic flexible drain pipe to it and run it somewhere else. The connection would have to be solid. Might need to downsize depending on what’s available to use.
So what kind of sleeve would I use in either scenario? In my mind I’m imagining a giant hose clamp. Is there something specific for metal to plastic?
This is so weird. Thanks again.
Be careful, fighting the city/town hall can be tough and expensive. They have unlimited funds to fight you (taxes). I’m not trying to have you join another forum, but the tractorbynet forum has all kinds of useful info on moving water (if you search). I don’t know what state you live in and I probably don’t know their laws and regualtions so I am not inclined to offer any advice that might put you in a worse situation.
My brother lives in NJ and he had to have an environmental plan submitted and approved, two code inspectors come out, and and engineer say it ok, to move water from his business drive to the ground behind his building. He has a very small parking area and it just killed me to hear it. I, on the other hand, dug 100+ of trench and ran a pipe to sunlight (using the grade) to drain my foundation. No permit, no plans, just one code inspector and he took a 2 second look at it and said nice job.
Sorry to hear about your troubles, good luck to you.
The coupler will depend on what type of pipe it is. If it’s galvanized corrugated you can get one of these.
Or there are these.
I think being able to just plug it depends on drainage. Where does the water go if you do plug the end of it? If it won’t hurt anything as far as water flow goes I’d just plug it. You’d want to plug it from the other end or the ground will always be mushy there unless you can plug it 100%. I’m sure some water would leak through somewhere. You might have to check with the city before plugging it. If plugging it will affect water flow in a detrimental way I would extend the pipe like Heath said. That can get costly depending on how far and how deep you need to run the pipe though.
1 Like
Maybe an extension with something like this (but appropriate to your application obviously)
This may work. The capping it would be exclusively to piss the city off. Their attorney has already confirmed there is no easement and no city pipe on our property. I double checked with the county about the easement. Coincidentally in the same letter he mentions that it would be illegal for the city to dig or use city equipment on our property.
If I plug it, in theory, it would back up the ditch which would roll over onto the street which would then become a curbing/drainage issue for them.
Thanks all.
Joe
I haven’t had the opportunity his weekend.
Our attorney has told us to get estimates to replace the white oak tree, dig up the existing pipe and replace it, and shore up the retaining wall behind the septic field. I am assuming he is working under the premise that the city’s attorney had previously (we were asking for the to maintain this thing) wrote to us stating it “would be illegal to use city employees or equipment on private property.”
That being said, I should have those in by the end of the week, I just hope it doesn’t rain much.
