Location of services - who to contact?

muffler

I have a client (Donegal) who proposes to build a house with access to the plot via a Council housing estate in an urban area. It would then be proposed to connect to water, sewer etc serving that estate and to this end I need to know the exact location, invert levels etc of the services.

My client attempted to get this information at local level but was told by an Irish Water employee that there was "nothing he could do for him and to talk to the local planner". I find this response to be completely unacceptable and accordingly I would ask you to provide these details. 

Obviously we cant lodge a planning application without showing details of connection to and location of all services so could you confirm who I should be talking to or dealing with here in Donegal in order to obtain this information.

Thanks in advance

PM me if necessary.

Irish Water: Alex

Hi muffler,

Thanks for your query.

Please see wtr.ie/Connections for more information on applying for water and wastewater connections to homes and businesses throughout Ireland.

If you have any further queries, please let us know.

Kind regards,
Alex

muffler

Alex, thanks for the reply and link.

Unfortunately that is of no use to me as ultimately it redirects me to Donegal Co Co's website for an application form for a water connection.

I'll repeat the request. I need to establish the precise location (and levels where appropriate) of the domestic water mains, the public sewer and the storm water drainage system. Who do I contact to get that information?

I need this information in order to prepare drawings for submitting with a planning application which, as I'm sure you know, will be referred to IE for a report during the planning process.

I think that's a fairly simple request.

Thanks.

Irish Water: Alex

Hi muffler,

Thanks for your update.

We would recommend contacting the Planning department within your Local Authority, as they may be able to provide you with specific information in regards to the layout and location of any pipework that would enter the property in question.

Thanks,
Alex

muffler

Hi Alex,

I think its fairly safe to assume that you are not familiar with the planning process which is quite understandable. Each to their own as they say. I dont profess to know anything about customer support hence the need to ask questions here and hopefully be guided by someone like yourself.

If that info was available from the local planning dept I would have had access to it by now. This issue was discussed at a pre-planning meeting that we had with planning officials 2 weeks ago and the onus was naturally put on myself and my client to establish the location of the services. The bottom line here is that a planning dept in any county does not hold any of that information. That is why the services must be shown to them on the submitted plans and maps which in turn they refer to IE to confirm its acceptance or objection to the proposal.

I appreciate that you are probably doing your best but I have to say that it is very disappointing to find that a rep for a state sponsored company cant supply an appropriate answer to a simple question. 

I can do a FOI request if thats what it takes but that would be akin to cracking a nut with a sledge hammer and I dont think it would make for good reading by those further up the food chain. If you cant answer my query then please just say so as I can then escalate this matter.

Thank you for your time.

Irish Water: Alex

Hi muffler,

Thanks for your message and apologies for any inconvenience this has caused.

As part of Irish Water's process, we would recommend that customers contact the Planning department within their Local Authority, as they would be able to provide further details on the location and levels of the domestic pipework that would enter a property within a certain area.

If you would like us to contact the relevant department for this information, on your behalf, would you mind sending us a PM with the following details:

- Name;
- Location of the proposed property; and
- Contact number.

Thanks,
Alex

muffler

Alex, with respect, you haven't really done anything here to help me. As stated earlier I appreciate that you are probably not familiar with the planning process and the steps involved including the requirement to indicate on plans and maps the location of and connection points to public services. But as a rep for IW you need to pass the likes of this on to someone who does know and then revert to me with an answer. Just for the record and for future reference only council estates built after 1994 would have required planning permission therefore planning offices around the country will not have details of pipe networks for older estates.

This isn't one of your run of the mill threads here where stock replies can be given. What I expected to happen when starting this thread was that I would be requested to PM my details together with the location of the property concerned and in return you or whatever rep would deal with this query would then establish who your engineer is for that specific area and he would then be asked to contact me or alternatively I would be given his contact details by PM of course. Sadly that never happened. Going forward this is the approach that should be taken in my view and while I'm not being critical the public have to be given the information and details which they are entitled to. 

In conclusion I have sought out contact details at local level and I have since received an email from an engineer who I shall be meeting up with shortly, on site, where we can then determine the details of the various services. 

Irish Water: Alex

Hi muffler,

Thank you for your message and we apologise if you are unhappy with our response.

Irish Water: Alex wrote: »

If you would like us to contact the relevant department for this information, on your behalf, would you mind sending us a PM with the following details:

- Name;
- Location of the proposed property; and
- Contact number.

Thanks,
Alex

As previously requested, if you would like to send your details via PM, we will be more than happy to forward on your query to the relevant department, who will request an update from your Local Authority.

Alternatively, we can pass on any further questions you may have, following on from your meeting with the engineer you are in contact with locally.

Kind regards,
Alex

Stepping Stone

muffler wrote: »

Alex, thanks for the reply and link.

Unfortunately that is of no use to me as ultimately it redirects me to Donegal Co Co's website for an application form for a water connection.

I'll repeat the request. I need to establish the precise location (and levels where appropriate) of the domestic water mains, the public sewer and the storm water drainage system. Who do I contact to get that information?

I need this information in order to prepare drawings for submitting with a planning application which, as I'm sure you know, will be referred to IE for a report during the planning process.

I think that's a fairly simple request.

Thanks.

Muffler, reading between the lines here, but it seems to me like neither Irish Water nor Donegal Co Co have this information. This is obviously a private development, ie not a council estate. It is highly unlikely that the pipes were ever surveyed or mapped by the developer, less likely still to have been submitted to the council after.

I work in engineering, this happens all the time. If it was a Celtic Tiger build, the developer is probably gone but if not, contact them and find out if any of the information that you need was recorded or handed over to the council.

Irish Water will only have the information passed onto them by the council. The council will only have the information passed on by the developer.

The normal solution to this is a road opening licence and some excavation. I know this, because we have had to do it regularly at work.

muffler

Stepping Stone wrote: »

Muffler, reading between the lines here, but it seems to me like neither Irish Water nor Donegal Co Co have this information. This is obviously a private development, ie not a council estate. It is highly unlikely that the pipes were ever surveyed or mapped by the developer, less likely still to have been submitted to the council after.

I work in engineering, this happens all the time. If it was a Celtic Tiger build, the developer is probably gone but if not, contact them and find out if any of the information that you need was recorded or handed over to the council.

Irish Water will only have the information passed onto them by the council. The council will only have the information passed on by the developer.

The normal solution to this is a road opening licence and some excavation. I know this, because we have had to do it regularly at work.

Thanks for the comments Stepping Stone. In other circumstances I would fully agree with you.

However the estate is definitely a Council estate and was built over 40 years ago but I'm not hopeful with regards to getting "as constructed drawings" for the services. I have been talking to a senior engineer by phone and I'm waiting on him to get back to me with a time and date for us to meet on the site as that seems the only way of identifying what's what and what's where.

I'm still trying to figure out what exactly Irish Water do but it's certainly not in the data provision business.

Stepping Stone

muffler wrote: »

Thanks for the comments Stepping Stone. In other circumstances I would fully agree with you.

However the estate is definitely a Council estate and was built over 40 years ago but I'm not hopeful with regards to getting "as constructed drawings" for the services. I have been talking to a senior engineer by phone and I'm waiting on him to get back to me with a time and date for us to meet on the site as that seems the only way of identifying what's what and what's where.

I'm still trying to figure out what exactly Irish Water do but it's certainly not in the data provision business.

I have dealt with each and every LA in the country. This is not unusual. A lot of the information is stored in people's heads/ notebooks/ not known at all.

It will take Irish Water about 20 years to build records. The LAs are literally a law unto themselves. They were never forced to record the details, so it is seriously hit or miss and the information is highly questionable.

My advice here is that you are aiming too high with a senior engineer. They won't know. You need the curator or caretaker. No levels will be known and everything will be in imperial but they will know the location of the service. I am pretty sure that we have never managed to get a drawing out of Donegal actually and I have been doing this since 2005.

muffler

Stepping Stone wrote: »

I have dealt with each and every LA in the country. This is not unusual. A lot of the information is stored in people's heads/ notebooks/ not known at all.

It will take Irish Water about 20 years to build records. The LAs are literally a law unto themselves. They were never forced to record the details, so it is seriously hit or miss and the information is highly questionable.

My advice here is that you are aiming too high with a senior engineer. They won't know. You need the curator or caretaker. No levels will be known and everything will be in imperial but they will know the location of the service. I am pretty sure that we have never managed to get a drawing out of Donegal actually and I have been doing this since 2005.

Trust me, I know exactly what you are talking about ..... I worked for them a long number of years ago  :D

What happened here was that, acting on my advice, the client contacted the local caretaker by phone who initially said he would call out on a certain day (I didnt necessarily have to be there) but it was a no show. When the client phoned him the following week he, the caretaker, said he wouldnt be coming out and that there was nothing he could do. I found this to be completely unacceptable and hence the thread here.

Being told here in this forum by an IW rep to contact the local planning dept is also unacceptable and this query was handled very poorly for the reasons outlined further back in the thread.

I did send an email off to the council and it was their senior engineer who replied inviting me to ring him with a view to meeting on site. I talked to him last week and as he was tied up on several days he is supposed to call back this week which is looking unlikely now. But I have talked to the same guy in the past and he is helpful and the best part of this is, as you rightly pointed out, he wont know where exactly the services are but when we meet up on site he will have the local caretaker with him. This will be the same caretaker who refused to meet the client or provide any information so that will be interesting. :)