A driveway edge detail showing a linear channel drain set flush against the charcoal kerb course, taking surface water away before it reaches the pavement.

A channel drain set flush at the threshold. On a frontage that falls towards the pavement this is not a detail, it is the whole drainage strategy. From one of our completed projects.

East Twickenham runs from Richmond Bridge back towards St Margarets, and it is largely Victorian and Edwardian family housing: solid semi-detached and detached villas, and terraces on the roads behind them.

Two things distinguish driveway work here. The frontages are shallow relative to the size of the houses, because these were built as walk-and-carriage houses rather than car houses. And the ground moves, because the land falls towards the river.

Neither is a problem. Both need to be dealt with deliberately rather than discovered halfway through.

The East Twickenham frontage

Levels are the recurring theme

Frontages that fall to the footway

On roads sloping towards the river, the front garden often sits above pavement level, sometimes by a course or two of brick. Paving that surface without addressing the fall sends every drop of rain straight onto the public footway, which Richmond upon Thames does not permit and which ices in winter.

The answer is a channel drain across the threshold taking water to a soakaway within the boundary, or a permeable build. It is designed at the start, not added at the end.

Retaining, not just edging

Where the frontage is higher than the pavement, the front boundary wall is holding ground back rather than simply marking a line. That is a retaining structure and needs a proper foundation and drainage behind it.

Rebuilding one as though it were a decorative low wall is a common and expensive mistake. See edging, kerbs and boundary walls.

Levels against the house

Period houses here often have their damp proof course low, and generations of successive surfacing have raised the ground against the wall. Adding another layer makes an existing damp problem worse.

Finished paving should sit at least 150mm below the damp proof course and fall away from the building. Sometimes that means digging out more than people expect, and we would rather say so at quote stage.

Shallow depth for the size of house

Large houses, modest front gardens. As in St Margarets, the constraint for a new crossover is usually whether a car sits fully within the boundary. Measure from the back of the footway before committing to an application.

Underneath

Ground near the river

Closer to the Thames, the river terrace gravels are generally better developed, which is helpful. Granular ground drains freely, takes a soakaway readily and supports a standard sub-base build. Permeable construction here is often more straightforward than on the clay further out.

What varies more is what has been done to the ground since. These are frontages that have been dug up for services, altered, extended and re-surfaced over more than a century, and made ground with old brick rubble, forgotten foundations and buried steps is common. That is exactly the sort of thing a trial hole finds and a telephone quote does not. More on groundworks.

Conservation and the street scene

Parts of East Twickenham fall within designated conservation areas, including the Richmond Road area. Where they apply, permitted development rights are narrower and the front boundary treatment is usually the sensitive element.

Check your address rather than your street, because these boundaries sometimes run along one side of a road only. See our planning permission guide.

East Twickenham is a few minutes from us and we are on these roads often. For the wider picture, see our block paving installers in Twickenham page.

Most asked for here

On a sloping frontage, paving that has moved is frequently a levels and drainage problem rather than a base failure, and correcting it properly means lifting a larger area than the visible fault.

If water reaches your footway

It is worth putting right whether or not you are altering the driveway. Water discharging onto the highway is not permitted, and in a cold snap it becomes your liability as much as your inconvenience.

Free, no-obligation quote

Driveways in East Twickenham

Tell us about your driveway and your plans. We’ll get back to you within 24 hours.

If your frontage falls towards the pavement, or sits high against the house, mention it. Those two things shape the job more than anything else here.