On Sat, 7 Apr 2012 08:50:14 +0100, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 23:03:20 on
Fri, 6 Apr 2012, Charles Ellson remarked:
Compulsory purchase powers are available to local and national
government and to various other bodies under a range of legislation
and for varying purposes. Property will not always pass by purchase,
e.g. some of my drains are now the property (along with responsibility
for repair and upkeep) of the local water company due to recent
legislation affecting common drains.

The correct term is "sewer", not "drain".

"Private sewers and lateral drains" it says here.

"There are now only public sewers (owned and maintained by the
sewerage companies) and private drains (the responsibility of property
owners)."
[http://www.southernwater.co.uk/Domes...rshipChanges/]

And when the ownership is transferred, do the water company also own any
relevant manholes and manhole covers, or just the pipes?

I wondered about that myself. My water company doesn't seem to want to
tell you (possibly because they don't deal with taking the waste away)
but :-

"Who owns inspection chambers?

For transferred sewers, Southern Water will own manholes and
inspection chambers (and covers). Householders will generally be
responsible for inspection chambers on drains, but water companies
will typically need access to the chamber at the head of the lateral
drain (the first one inside the property boundary)."
[http://www.southernwater.co.uk/Domes...shipQandA.asp]

So, in my case I've only got a couple of short bits of pipe to worry
about as the rest is common.


Out of interest, before the transfer, did detached houses own (in a
property sense) the pipe under the pavement and road connecting to the
public sewer - because they were responsible for it.

The Thames Water leaflet
[http://www.thameswater.co.uk/cps/rde...une_-2011.pdf]
shows them as private up to the point where they join the main
sewer/drain but I think they have ignored a difference mentioned by
Southern Water for those existing before 1937.
When local authorities were still clearing blockages, the common pipe
in my mother's back garden (blocked by disposable nappies from a
neighbour) was always cleared without charge, the house being built
around 1925.

I don't remember them being "shown in red" on my deeds.

They are usually covered in the sections dealing with easements and
covenants as IMU a common drain or neighbour's drain does not involve
ownership of the land space through which it passes but the right to
put the drain through the land; the location is IME not usually
specified and it is maybe not a good idea to do it except when it
becomes a genuine necessity. As there is no land ownership then there
is no property to be marked.