For lots of people, parking outside their own home can be both a cause of stress and come at a monetary cost if you need to buy a resident’s permit.
In particular urban regions, it can still be difficult to find a spot to leave your car near to home.
A dropped kerb is a legal necessity if you wish to drive over the pavement onto your property.
Any access onto a public highway from a residential or commercial driveway area should have a dropped kerb.
A dropped kerb permits vehicles to cross the pavement from the road to a driveway and it is a legal necessity to have a dropped kerb if you wish to drive across the pavement onto your property.
Putting in a dropped kerb can make a significant improvement to accessing your property as well as helping to ensure people do not park in front of your driveway.
The law pertaining to dropped kerbs states: If you intend to drive a vehicle over the footway in to your driveway off a highway, then you will need to have a dropped kerb.
If you do not have dropped kerb, you must not drive over the footway. If you do this, you are breaking the law and enforcement action might be taken to prevent such practice.
The pavement may need to be strengthened in front of the building, and sometimes, it may be essential for lampposts, manhole covers and other street furniture to be relocated.
Drop Kerb Specialists in Retford
Dropped kerbs also called vehicle access crossovers, are an alteration to the footpath. It involves lowering the kerb and preparing new foundations to the paving to enable a car to be driven onto the front area of a property.
The work includes lowering the kerbstones and strengthening the pavement to create a ramp, and must solely be performed by an authorised company with Street Works Accreditation, and who have the required Public Liability insurance to comply with the local authorities regulations.
Vehicle access cross overs consist normally of 3 or 4 dropped kerbs with a tapered or transition kerb on either side. The conventional maximum total width at road level of dropped kerbs for a VAC is 3.6 metres (i.e. normally 4 dropped kerbs).
Our team have many years experience in putting in drop kerbs and making an application for the relevant planning permission. We are able to work in partnership with your local county council to install a dropped kerb while complying with all essential regulations.
You can either apply to your local council for permission for a dropped kerb outside your building or we are able to apply to your local authority in your place.
We are members of the Streetworks Qualifications Register (SWQR). The SWQR holds information of qualified providers who have gained the proper qualifications in relation to the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991, which is necessary for any contractor excavating a highway.
We focus on delivering a service that gets it correct the first time. By investing in high quality components, equipment and processes, we ensure that we deliver lasting and affordable solutions that will last.
We pride ourselves on our outstanding workmanship and customer care and we ensure that each and every job is carried out to the finest quality standards.
Our team can check out your site to perform a free no-obligation survey. This enables our surfacing contractors to fully understand your needs and provide an accurate and competitive quote.
Local Kerb Dropping Contractors
The huge growth in interest for off-street parking has seen a growing number of people drop kerbs to establish car standing at the front of their homes.
Research by home insurer Direct Line shows that off-street parking is seen by estate agents as a beneficial feature which adds market value to a property. This, combined with increasing parking limitations in many residential areas, has brought about planning applications for dropped kerbs increase massively over recent years.
However while adding car standing space to the front of your home can add market value to your property, there are many things to think about, not least environmental consequences, and flooding is a big problem.
When you switch out a front lawn with hard standing, rainwater can no longer soak into the ground. As more and more households take this action, the collective effect severely increases the risk of flooding, so it’s important to include drainage in your plans.
Planning permission is generally needed if you wish to drop the kerb outside your building to enable a car to cross the pavement. This is due to the fact that the pavement might need to be strengthened to take the weight of motor vehicles and prevent them from damaging the surface or any pipes or cables below. It is also to ensure the new access will not be a safety risk to other highway users.
You can learn if you need planning permission by contacting your local council (you can find the relevant council at the government website). How much it costs to apply will depend upon your location.
If permission is granted, you then you need to locate a local professional to do the work for you.
It’s certainly not a DIY job as the council will have requirements that contractors must meet. Some will only permit you to use their endorsed contractors, while others allow you to use your own, so long as they are accredited to the requirements of the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991, and carry public liability insurance. For this case, there might be an additional charge for highway inspections by the council.
Retford Vehicle Crossover Experts
However first it’s worth establishing if permission is likely to be given. Below is a checklist of points to consider. If any among these criteria is not met, planning permission is very likely to be declined:
- Your front garden must be big enough for you to park your vehicle entirely on your property.
- The kerb must be at minimum 4.8 m from the front of your house; or 6m if the parking area is in front of an entrance or garage.
- The parking area must be at least 2.4 m wide.
- The proposed access to your property must be more than 10m away from a road junction; 15m away from busy junctions or on major roads.
- It must be at least 1.5 m away from street lights and other street furniture.
- It must meet visibility guidelines; this is dependent on the type of road.
- Suitable drainage must be provided to take the surplus surface water.
The extraction of tree roots must be avoided. - The incline from your property to the road must not be too steep.
- Finally, you as the property owner must consent to the kerb being dropped; for example, a tenant can not apply on their landlord’s behalf.