For lots of people, parking outside their own home can be both a reason for stress and come at a financial cost if you need to buy a resident’s permit.
In particular urban regions, it can still be tricky to find a spot to leave your car close to home.
A dropped kerb is a legal necessity if you wish to drive across the pavement onto your residential or commercial property.
Any access onto a public highway from a domestic 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.
Installing a dropped kerb can make a significant improvement to easy access your property as well as helping to ensure people do not park across your driveway.
The law pertaining to dropped kerbs states: If you plan to drive a vehicle over the footway into 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 so, you are breaking the law and enforcement action might be taken to prevent such practice.
The pavement may require to be reinforced in front of the building, and in some cases, it may be essential for lampposts, manhole covers and various other street furniture to be moved.
Drop Kerb Specialists in Ilkeston
Dropped kerbs also known as 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 provider with Street Works Accreditation, and who have the required Public Liability insurance to comply with the local authorities requirements.
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).
We have many years experience in putting in drop kerbs and applying for the relevant planning permission. We are able to work in conjunction with your local county council to install a dropped kerb whilst abiding by 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 on your behalf.
We are members of the Streetworks Qualifications Register (SWQR). The SWQR holds information of qualified providers who have gained the appropriate qualifications in regard to the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991, which is necessary for any provider excavating a highway.
We focus on delivering a product that gets it right the first time. By buying high quality materials, equipment and processes, we ensure that we deliver sustainable and cost effective solutions that will last.
We pride ourselves on our exceptional workmanship and client care and we ensure that each and every job is performed to the finest quality standards.
Our team can check out your site to perform a free no-obligation survey. This allows our surfacing contractors to fully understand your needs and provide an accurate and affordable quote.
Local Kerb Dropping Contractors
The huge growth in interest for off-street parking has seen more and more people drop kerbs to establish car standing at the front of their properties.
Research by home insurer Direct Line shows that off-street parking is regarded by estate agents as a desirable feature which adds market value to a residential or commercial property. This, combined with increasing parking restrictions in many residential areas, has resulted in planning applications for dropped kerbs increase greatly over recent years.
But while adding car standing space to the front of your home may add market value to your property, there are numerous things to take into consideration, not least environmental consequences, and flooding is a major issue.
When you replace a front lawn with hard standing, rain can no longer soak into the ground. As increasingly more households take this step, the collective effect severely increases the danger of flooding, so it’s important to include drainage in your plans.
Planning permission is normally called for if you wish to drop the kerb outside your building to permit a car to cross the pavement. This is due to the fact that the pavement may need to be reinforced to take the weight of motor vehicles and help prevent them from damaging the surface or any pipes or cables underneath. It is in addition to ensure the new access will not be a safety risk to other highway users.
You can learn if you require planning permission by contacting your local council (you can identify the relevant council at the government website). How much it costs to apply will be dependent on your specific location.
If permission is granted, you then you need to find a local professional to perform the work for you.
It’s certainly not a DIY job as the council will have requirements that service providers must meet. Several will only allow you to use their endorsed contractors, while others allow you to use your own, provided that they are accredited to the requirements of the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991, and hold public liability insurance. In this case, there may be an additional charge for highway inspections by the council.
Ilkeston Vehicle Crossover Experts
But first it’s worth verifying if consent is likely to be given. Below is a checklist of considerations. If any one of these criteria is not really met, planning permission is likely to be denied:
- Your front garden needs to be big enough for you to park your vehicle fully on your property.
- The kerb needs to be at minimum 4.8 m from the front of your house; or 6m if the parking area is in front of a door or garage.
- The parking area should be at least 2.4 m wide.
- The suggested access to your property should be more than 10m away from a road junction; 15m away from busy junctions or on primary roads.
- It must be at least 1.5 m away from street lamps and various other street furniture.
- It must meet visibility guidelines; this depends on the type of road.
- Suitable drainage needs to be provided to take the surplus surface water.
The removal of tree roots should be avoided. - The incline from your property to the road must not be too steep.
- Finally, you as the homeowner must agree to the kerb being dropped; as an example, a renter can not apply on their landlord’s behalf.