neighbour's planned development next door.. difficult situation

donegaLroad

hi,

We live in a rural country area. Our neighbour owned several acres of land which he divided up and sold as sites back in 2003. 4 houses were built on this land along the same stretch of road. There is a site which was left vacant between us and a neighbour on which trees and shrubs were planted. It is also where our waste water from our tank drains into via our raised peculation system.

Last October a digger started work clearing the site, the trees and shrubs were all cleared and the centre of the site filled in. Our neighbour is planning to open a market garden with poly tunnels and a car park etc.


We had been on the fence, so to speak, until we noticed our septic tank starting to back up. I checked under the lids of the waste water system in our backyard only to find they were overflowing. So we alerted our neighbour and told him what was happening... he said that during the site clearance, he had installed new ducting leading from our waste water outlet into his site, and he found fault with the original builder for using lesser quality ducting on our side which may have become blocked over time, and when the excavator was back on site he would dig up the pipe and have a look.

So we called the septic tank guy and he came the next day and emptied our tank. But 10 days later and I notice that the tank is starting to fill again, and when I lifted the lid on the system outside, sure enough there is a new build-up of waste water, and it will be no time until the tank is full again.

Now our next door neighbour tells us that she is experiencing the same thing, her toilets are filling very high when they are flushed and some of her drains outside are starting to overflow (same as what was happening with us), a problem which she has never had before. Her tank is a self-emptying waste water system also.

Ascii

Correct me if I am wrong but it appears that the runoff from you septic tank percolates into a site adjacent to yours. this can be quiet a problem. Can you answer a few questions.
Did you buy the site and build the house and do ground works yourself or did you but the house when it was built. Did the neighbour who is building the alotments/gardens build the houses or was he just responsible for selling the fields/sites originally.
Initially you need to get onto the county council website and see what the planning application called up for in relation to septic tanks and runoff on your site.
The norm would be for the septic tank to work within your own site boundary and not drain into an adjacent site. There may be issues with soakage in your site and a badly installed percolation system. If its a case that the original application showed the discharge draining into another site then there may be ownership issues relating to that site that has been overgrown up to now.

If you can supply some supplementary information people here will offer some advice. A good engineer is the very first call you should make and maybe a solicitor thereafter.

mickdw

Ok so your percolation area is in adjoining plot.
Is there where planning showed it?
If so, do you have legal agreement to access, maintain inspect the system within that property?
If planning showed it all contained within your own site, the neighbours works should have nothing to do with your system.
Is not so clear in your post but is it possible that you have a pipe simply taking treated effluent to a boundary drain and this is what is now blocked. If that is the case, you don't have a leg to stand on as effluent, even following treatment must be distributed in percolation drains and not direct to watercourse / drain.
The reality therfore is - If your percolation area is on your own site, there should be no pipes going to neighbours site and there should be no need for pipes going to that site.

donegaLroad

Ascii wrote: »

Correct me if I am wrong but it appears that the runoff from you septic tank percolates into a site adjacent to yours. this can be quiet a problem. Can you answer a few questions.
Did you buy the site and build the house and do ground works yourself or did you but the house when it was built. Did the neighbour who is building the alotments/gardens build the houses or was he just responsible for selling the fields/sites originally.
Initially you need to get onto the county council website and see what the planning application called up for in relation to septic tanks and runoff on your site.
The norm would be for the septic tank to work within your own site boundary and not drain into an adjacent site. There may be issues with soakage in your site and a badly installed percolation system. If its a case that the original application showed the discharge draining into another site then there may be ownership issues relating to that site that has been overgrown up to now.

If you can supply some supplementary information people here will offer some advice. A good engineer is the very first call you should make and maybe a solicitor thereafter.

thanks for the responses..

Our perculation system (raised mound) is on our site.

We bought the house when it was built.

The neighbour sold the site to the person who built the house. He had no hand in the ground works... at least I dont think he had.

I looked on the county council website, and all it says for our house's planning application is that there was 5 conditions attached to planning being granted. What these conditions were are not listed, and I think I will have to order a copy to find out.

sydthebeat

as trees and shrubs were planted on the adjoining site, that screams to me that its a wet area.

when these trees and shrubs are removed you are basicllay removing the "sponge" which held the liquid, so it reappears again.

If the percolation area is on your site, its your responsibility to ensure it drains properly within the site constraints that you have.

The raised mound is supposed to deal with a high water / bed rock table.

If the tank is backing up, id suggest there is a not a sealed piped between your house, septic tank and pump... which it should be.

Dog of Tears

When you bought the property off the person who constructed it - what was mentioned in relation to the percolation area?
Was it ever mentioned at all?

It certainly should have been and your solicitor/engineer should have brought the matter to your attention and clarified the arrangements (wayleaves etc) associated with your percolation area being on a site outside your direct control - this should have been done before closing any contracts on the purchase of the property.

sydthebeat

Dog of Tears wrote: »

....... the arrangements (wayleaves etc) associated with your percolation area being on a site outside your direct control - this should have been done before closing any contracts on the purchase of the property.

its not though, the OP says as much in the last post

donegaLroad

Dog of Tears wrote: »

When you bought the property off the person who constructed it - what was mentioned in relation to the percolation area?
Was it ever mentioned at all?

It certainly should have been and your solicitor/engineer should have brought the matter to your attention and clarified the arrangements (wayleaves etc) associated with your percolation area being on a site outside your direct control - this should have been done before closing any contracts on the purchase of the property.

as far as I remember, it was never mentioned at all. In fact I thought that the percolation mound filtered all the waste water and I never actually thought where the water drained to, until a few years later. It never presented a problem so we never had reason to look into it.

Drift

Hi OP,

In general it would be rare for someone's effluent (treated or otherwise) to be allow discharge or drain into someone else's property.

It would need both a legal agreement and approval during the planning stage. I might be wrong here - but it seems to me you have neither. If this is the case you should not be discharging your effluent onto someone else's land and should be draining it away on your own land (which is probably what you have planning permission for.)

From your picture the ground conditions on both your site and the adjacent site look less than ideal for soakage/drainage of your effluent. (And that's putting it mildly!)

The correct way to go about your problem is to get the engineer who originally designed your treatment system (or at the very least get his drawings and specifications). They more than likely showed how he/she proposed that the effluent would be discharged completely within the boundary of your own site. Then you could correct your effluent treatment set-up to drain the way it was originally intended.

Obviously this advice is all based on the assumption that you have no permission (either planning or legal) to discharge effluent onto your neighbours site.


Edit as an afterthought: With regards to his planning - if you prove to the local authority with documentation that you have a legal agreement to discharge your effluent onto his land then you have some very valid concerns regarding permission for further development on the site. If you can't prove this and particularly if your planning shows you should be dealing with your own effluent then the problem of the effluent is entirely yours and you could get yourself into a lot of trouble telling people that you're piping it onto someone else's land.

mickdw

Reading all the posts so far, it appears to me that the problem is not the concern of the neighbour whatsoever and it would also appear that he is foolishly accommodating an outflow from your property onto his.
Assuming that all was to be percolated within the bounds of your property, I think you would be walking into ax world of hardship by contacting the council about this.
As someone suggested, you should dig out your planning file, find out exactly what was granted and then see what needs to be done to achieve that.

donegaLroad

mickdw wrote: »

Reading all the posts so far, it appears to me that the problem is not the concern of the neighbour whatsoever and it would also appear that he is foolishly accommodating an outflow from your property onto his.
Assuming that all was to be percolated within the bounds of your property, I think you would be walking into ax world of hardship by contacting the council about this.
As someone suggested, you should dig out your planning file, find out exactly what was granted and then see what needs to be done to achieve that.

I was just on to the planning office and am getting the planning file tomorrow.. I think I will steer clear of the council for now.. I think that the drainage arrangement may have been an unwritten agreement.

mickdw

donegaLroad wrote: »

I was just on to the planning office and am getting the planning file tomorrow.. I think I will steer clear of the council for now.. I think that the drainage arrangement may have been an unwritten agreement between the builder and neighbour when ground works began.

Yes it would seem that way. Have a look at the file anyway and see what you should have.
What county? Not available online?

slimjimmc

mickdw wrote: »

Reading all the posts so far, it appears to me that the problem is not the concern of the neighbour whatsoever and it would also appear that he is foolishly accommodating an outflow from your property onto his.
Assuming that all was to be percolated within the bounds of your property, I think you would be walking into ax world of hardship by contacting the council about this.
As someone suggested, you should dig out your planning file, find out exactly what was granted and then see what needs to be done to achieve that.

Foolish or not he mightn't want to rock the boat too much with the neighbours just yet, at least not until the PP is in the bag.

Ascii

donegaLroad wrote: »

I was just on to the planning office and am getting the planning file tomorrow.. I think I will steer clear of the council for now.. I think that the drainage arrangement may have been an unwritten agreement between the builder and neighbour when ground works began.

You would feel if the neighbour ever wanted to develop the site as he is planning on doing now then that was a pretty dumb ass thing to do at the time...but then again maybe he was trying to facilitate the sale and help things along. The builder might have known that the site could not adequately cope with the runoff without the help of the land next door. The planning file might give details of the percolation tests carried out.

Can you tell us a little more...e.g. Whats the site like (hilly, flat etc) Are there drains, streams, rivers near by. Is your septic tank percolation area out the back of the house or the front. Whats the land behind you like (bog, tillage, forestry, good agricultural etc) or are you backing onto adjoining properties.

donegaLroad

Ascii wrote: »

You would feel if the neighbour ever wanted to develop the site as he is planning on doing now then that was a pretty dumb ass thing to do at the time...but then again maybe he was trying to facilitate the sale and help things along. The builder might have known that the site could not adequately cope with the runoff without the help of the land next door. The planning file might give details of the percolation tests carried out.

Can you tell us a little more...e.g. Whats the site like (hilly, flat etc) Are there drains, streams, rivers near by. Is your septic tank percolation area out the back of the house or the front. Whats the land behind you like (bog, tillage, forestry, good agricultural etc) or are you backing onto adjoining properties.

Our site is very rocky, the rock breaker was there for 5 weeks when work began I have heard. The site beside us where the proposed development is waiting on approval is bog land. There was a gully running up the centre of it which has now been filled in as a foundation for a roadway.

Dog of Tears

The issue of most immediate concern would seem to be the loss of your existing percolation area in the adjacent site.

If it was me, the first step would be to establish a new percolation area within my own site - this should hopefully sort out the issues of your septic tank.


http://www.epa.ie/pubs/advice/water/wastewater/code%20of%20practice%20for%20single%20houses/Code%20of%20Practice%20Part%202.pdf

The attached doc from page 72 onwards provides guidance on carrying out a percolation test to establish if the conditions within your site are suitable for a percolation area.

Drift

I think you have two separate issues here OP:

1. Your effluent treatment system isn't working correctly. Solution - install new percolation area, drainage, etc. as necessary.

2. You have concerns about the proposed development on your neighbours land adversely affecting your quality of life. Solution - engage a planning professional to advise you on whether you have grounds to object based on the contents of the current County Development Plan.