Repairs on Private Property

 
    This property is the poster child for the stream buffer abuses the city has and why the law needs to be changed. The fence and the shed are both on the stream bank. The foundation for this shed =IS= the stream bank! There is a swimming pool built within the 25ft stream buffer that was law when it was built as well as some of the additions to the house. I don't have the legal documents but I was told there is an easement on this land for this storm water drain and that not too long ago the stream ran open through the side yard.
 
   This is the start of the mistakes made on the repair project. The city should NEVER have re-piped the stream on this private property and should have returned it to its natural state. Now because the stream is inside a pipe, all the storm water on this property can't get to the stream bank and is funneled into a small area right next to this shed. This is going to cause erosion next to the outlet of the pipe and erosion problems in his yard. An open stream would have allowed this water to drain directly into the stream like nature intended. Here is a shot of this area during the construction. All the water from the surrounding property will now flow between the left edge of this new concrete wall and this shed; far from ideal.
 

 
    Now some interesting things start happening. There is a budget for this project and they decide to use up the expensive concrete pipe at the downstream end of the project on this private property. 
 
    Two problems with this part of the plan: Why use the expensive pipe on private property that would be the easiest to replace later if needed? And second, since this is the highest "flow speed" type of pipe, why install it here so water is accelerated right before it leaves the system? This part of the project was covered up before I could photograph it so I have to assume that it was installed correctly (leap of faith). They also used this 60 inch concrete pipe under the road to replace the 42 inch pipe that was originally there. When they started digging up the  road, they dug into the water main and broke it in half causing the county repair crew to have to come out and reroute the pipes.
 

 
The next problem is the quality of the brick work used on the road side storm water basins. They build these so the water from the road can flow into the pipe. If they leak, water doesn't flow through the pipe but flows on the outside of the pipe eroding the support dirt under the pipe causing it to crack/collapse which is what creates sink holes and road failures. As you can easily see, there are large gaps and very little mortar used to build these. This is some of the worst brick work I think I've ever seen on any type of project, note the lower of these two that the pipe is connected to.
 

 

 

This is a small sample of the type of construction techniques used on this project and this part was some of their best work! Next is where the real problems are, if they had used the above techniques we might be OK.