Fixed
Gully outside of 5 Orchard Close
Sent to Lincolnshire County Council less than a minute later. Council ref: 2850367.
Gully quickly blocked during heavy rain on July 20th, flooding onto the drive to create a lake that surrounded the cars, reaching 8 ft away from the front door. If it hadn’t stopped raining I think it would have flooded the garage. Apparently this happened in 2007 and in the spring of 2023, so clearly the problem has not been solved. Photos were taken as the rains subsided, I have videos of the flood water at its worst, which I was unable to load. You can see surface water draining down from the top of Orchard Close#7, 9, 11 etc and from #3 to the gully, there is an obvious and visible flow. The gully can’t cope with the volume, it has happened every time there is heavy rain since we moved here in October 2023.0.I reported the same problem in October 2024, and have seen it happen a further 2 times, October & December 2023 (not reported, as we had just moved to the property in October 2023). I note that Craypool and Back Lane also experienced blocked gullies and flooding water on July 20th. Something is clearly wrong with the drainage system in the immediate area. All of the surface water for the top end of Orchard close specifically, it overwhelms the gully at the entrance of our property and then pours onto our drive, which clearly it should never do. I intend to report every time this happens because I believe it makes sense for the relevant authorities to build up a picture of what happens in Scothern when it rains heavily. I do hope that something can be done, thank you.
Updates
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Thanks for letting us know about your issue with standing water covering more than half the road. We will look into this and let you know what we find within the next 14 days. You can find out more about flooding and drainage on our website
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Thank you for your report. We will investigate and make an update to this report within 14 days.
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Great news, we’ve had a look at the issue and we have now passed to our Highways Officers for the team to assess what can be done to resolve the matter. We’ll let you know when the assessment has taken place.
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Thank you for sending someone to inspect the gully and main drain, today, Thursday 24th July 2025. . May I say, he was an extremely pleasant, patient and courteous young man. Our neighbour came out and showed the attached photograph to your colleague, it was taken in 2021, # 5’s drive and the roadside is completely flooded. She later also provided me with a video recording from 2022 showing the drive of #5 totally flooded, with neighbours helping the then owners to sweep the water away. I can the provide video footage of flood events in 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025.
The photos/videos collectively confirm that there is an underlying drainage problem of surface water that becomes quite serious and worrying for 5 Orchard Close. It has clearly happened every year since at least 2021, if not before.
Your colleague today lifted the main drain cover and we could see it is at least half blocked with dirt and leaves. Hopefully this can be flushed and cleared and will help.
I would like to ask today, in writing, if it is possible to consider a further gully being installed between # 7 and #9 Orchard Close as a remedy to all of the surface water flowing downhill to the gully at #5. This is where the bulk of the water is coming from. Some comes from the uphill direction of #3 Orchard Close, but it isn’t causing the problem. My recent video footage shows this to be true.
Your colleague noted that #5 is at the lowest point, and therefore all the surface water is naturally flowing our way, to the gully at the lowest point, right beside our drive.
I hope that flushing /cleaning the main drain will help, but wonder if it will solve the problem that has been going on at #5 Orchard Close for many years? If one of your team came to inspect the provision for gullies, and saw all our photo/video evidence, I think they would agree that the Close should have had a gully further upstream.
Thank you so much for acting so promptly. I know our public services are very stretched, and appreciate time being found to help us. As you can imagine, we are now very nervous when heavy rain falls. Anything you could do to rectify the problem would be deeply appreciated.
Kind regards, Julie Brown
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We have an update. Our highways team have issued this work out to one of their delivery gangs. We’ll let you know when the job is complete.
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Progress! We’ve completed our investigation and works are now planned. Once we know when work is due to take place we will let you know.
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We have an update. Our highways team have issued this work out to one of their delivery gangs. We’ll let you know when the job is complete.
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All done! The work’s finished and the issue is now resolved. Thank you for contacting us about this. Your report has meant that we can focus our effort where it’s needed most.
This report is now closed to updates from the public. You can make a new report in the same location.