For a long time now I'd always joked about the fight that will start over who is responsible for my pipes/drains/hole in the garden due to waste water/sewage considering the circumstances.
It was found that our main pipe that is normally just outside the boundary line, was indeed on the inside of the front fence. Right where all the rose bushes mainly were.
I'm not a great garden conniseur but the gardens had won a Horticultural garden award plus a couple of other smaller ones that I know of. It had a wall of rose bushes that reached higher than the fence in areas, and I would often see neighbours from down the road and around the block looking over the fence at the roses. There were multi colours and the first year I was there I managed to put together some posies to give to the females in the family on Christmas day. I was able to get a so so bunch together last Christmas, after the Sept quake they were never the same, their bases were caked in liquefaction. But they continued to grow but more sparingly.
That was until just after the snow. As the snow started to melt I stumbled across a sink hole in my front garden right next to the gate. It was quite a freaky looking thing as it had pulled down a whole rose bush and looked like a massive spider in a hole (oooohh)
A few weeks later I found a hand written note, saying they were coming to dig up my pipes.
Got home and they certainly werent wrong about digging up my pipes, man it was deep. I asked them the next morning if all the yukky crap and liquid was from the sewage pipes, ahha, eeewwwww! There was shitloads literally lol.
Day after that I found another note and it apologised for the mess that was there/. The digger was in the middle of my garden, the rose bushes pulled out, a massive trench running along the inside of my fence which extended past my driveway, hence a slab of concrete on the drive was broken up to allow the trench to go further.
Tell ya I must have looked stupid trying to cock my leg over the gate with a laptop in one and my handbag in another, and would hate to think what I looked like trying to get the recycle bin out. With them extending the trench to thru my drivway I had a small area to get over the trench. and the gate would not open. The cars were kept on the road for at least three weeks. My poor Falcon has degraded in the silt conditions outside. Sometime Im going to check this out as I had no other choice but to leave them on my footpath and the other on the curb.
In the last month and a half, Arrow came out (Yes I was surprised to get a call on behalf of AMI as I had truly forgotten what they were there for after dealing with EQC for so long), but the guy who came out was good from what I saw and he was even interested in my thoughts on the state of the house. I am still waiting on the DRA report results from this visit.
Anway when he called out he was very surprised that the trench had been left as it was and put 'Danger tape' around the trench as much as he could, mainly around the gate, and my side block wall, then rang the company the next day to ask what the heck......
I came home the next night and the trench was filled in, for now with dirt and stones, thanks to Darryl from Arrow.
For the last month or so I have had a second hole, which we first dug some up trying to find the sump but never did get far, too much work :)
The Sunday after this I was going over to mum's to pick up tea (she has been helping our situation by cooking quiter often for us). I noticed all the dirty water in our gutter and realised then that lots of the times I seen the water, it was actually from our property. It caught me offguard that the very next day the Council must have turned up and dug deeper to get to the sump. I have no idea how they knew that fast about this as I had had problems with sewage since the Feb quake.
Got home from work and found they had done this, I took a pic and it looked like a mans thingy lol. Theres some pics on my other blogs of this (Life in the Orange Zone pipes pipes pipes). A night after that took some more pics and noticed the pipes that looked to be together had broken. Im sure that was due to the pressure of getting to the stump so it was something that would have happened either way. Anyway I think they camera'd it,and blew them at least twice, and funnily enought this time they grabbed a trellis form my back yard and have used that to slightly coer the hole. This hole is still there.
Right, to get to the point of all this, I rang EQC re:Emergency repairs since I was no longer Orange Zone, although they were shocked that it had been left like this, they assured me it was not them responsible, but the Council. I rang the Council and was asked things like 'Is the hole the problem, the lawn etc, my response being 'Ive got screwed pipes, a damaged front garden and lawn, and still water going under my house, my land and in the gutter grrrrrrrr......The lady actually spoke to someone who is going to investigate and get back to me. My guess is they will ring me and tell me that its insurance who are responsible, but we'll see, I may get a pleasant surprise yet, fingers crossed! But its hard to believe it, would they bother to fully fix my pipes when the house is either to be repaired and lifted or rebuilt?
Lets see what happens tomorrow.
I gotta stop talking, speak to ya tomorrow night
It was found that our main pipe that is normally just outside the boundary line, was indeed on the inside of the front fence. Right where all the rose bushes mainly were.
I'm not a great garden conniseur but the gardens had won a Horticultural garden award plus a couple of other smaller ones that I know of. It had a wall of rose bushes that reached higher than the fence in areas, and I would often see neighbours from down the road and around the block looking over the fence at the roses. There were multi colours and the first year I was there I managed to put together some posies to give to the females in the family on Christmas day. I was able to get a so so bunch together last Christmas, after the Sept quake they were never the same, their bases were caked in liquefaction. But they continued to grow but more sparingly.That was until just after the snow. As the snow started to melt I stumbled across a sink hole in my front garden right next to the gate. It was quite a freaky looking thing as it had pulled down a whole rose bush and looked like a massive spider in a hole (oooohh)
Got home and they certainly werent wrong about digging up my pipes, man it was deep. I asked them the next morning if all the yukky crap and liquid was from the sewage pipes, ahha, eeewwwww! There was shitloads literally lol.
Day after that I found another note and it apologised for the mess that was there/. The digger was in the middle of my garden, the rose bushes pulled out, a massive trench running along the inside of my fence which extended past my driveway, hence a slab of concrete on the drive was broken up to allow the trench to go further.
Tell ya I must have looked stupid trying to cock my leg over the gate with a laptop in one and my handbag in another, and would hate to think what I looked like trying to get the recycle bin out. With them extending the trench to thru my drivway I had a small area to get over the trench. and the gate would not open. The cars were kept on the road for at least three weeks. My poor Falcon has degraded in the silt conditions outside. Sometime Im going to check this out as I had no other choice but to leave them on my footpath and the other on the curb.
In the last month and a half, Arrow came out (Yes I was surprised to get a call on behalf of AMI as I had truly forgotten what they were there for after dealing with EQC for so long), but the guy who came out was good from what I saw and he was even interested in my thoughts on the state of the house. I am still waiting on the DRA report results from this visit.
Anway when he called out he was very surprised that the trench had been left as it was and put 'Danger tape' around the trench as much as he could, mainly around the gate, and my side block wall, then rang the company the next day to ask what the heck......
I came home the next night and the trench was filled in, for now with dirt and stones, thanks to Darryl from Arrow.
The Sunday after this I was going over to mum's to pick up tea (she has been helping our situation by cooking quiter often for us). I noticed all the dirty water in our gutter and realised then that lots of the times I seen the water, it was actually from our property. It caught me offguard that the very next day the Council must have turned up and dug deeper to get to the sump. I have no idea how they knew that fast about this as I had had problems with sewage since the Feb quake.
Right, to get to the point of all this, I rang EQC re:Emergency repairs since I was no longer Orange Zone, although they were shocked that it had been left like this, they assured me it was not them responsible, but the Council. I rang the Council and was asked things like 'Is the hole the problem, the lawn etc, my response being 'Ive got screwed pipes, a damaged front garden and lawn, and still water going under my house, my land and in the gutter grrrrrrrr......The lady actually spoke to someone who is going to investigate and get back to me. My guess is they will ring me and tell me that its insurance who are responsible, but we'll see, I may get a pleasant surprise yet, fingers crossed! But its hard to believe it, would they bother to fully fix my pipes when the house is either to be repaired and lifted or rebuilt?
Lets see what happens tomorrow.
I gotta stop talking, speak to ya tomorrow night
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