Believe it or not...

[ban-all-sheds]

... it's a fact.

I live in a house built in the 1950s, and in our road, on all the houses, the surface (i.e. roof) water drainage does indeed go into the foul sewers.

AFAIK, there is no separate surface water drainage system in our road.

Thinking about having an extension, which clearly means more surface water drainage.

London = clay soil = soakaway very unlikely to work, particularly as I could already grow rice in my back garden during the rainy season. I kid you not - a slightly more than averagely wet few weeks between October and April will result in standing water in my garden.

Does anybody have any views on how likely it is that I would be allowed to connect new guttering to the existing downpipe which empties into the foul sewer?

Thames Water, if that's relevant.

PS - boats and rocking are why I'm reluctant to ask TW at this stage, who have recently (generously ?) assumed ownership of all the private sewers which run from house to house before emptying into the big smelly pipe in the street.

 

[noseall]

The first choice is always to drain storm water on your own property.

Second choice is a dedicated storm system that would carry the water to a natural water course like a stream or brook or river.

Last resort is running into the sewer system but is by no means excluded.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Aye no problem if the preferable choices are unavailable/impractical.

 

[tew1]

Alot of 50's houses were built with combined sewers. If the soil is clay, a soakaway will not work and would need to be so large that i would probably cause subsidence to the house, I had the same problem when building an extension, the council is usually aware of this situation, and allows you to run new drains to the existing foul sewer.