Block Paving and drainage (SUDS)

Hi,

I'm about to start drawing plans for a block paved drive before laying it. I have a question regarding rain water runoff and drainage.

The road is approximately 150mm higher than the dpc of the house, so there will be a natural fall towards the house and consequently I need a way to remove rainwater.

The simplest way to get rid of the water is to have a gravel/flower bed directly in front of the house for the water to soak away into, but is this acceptable/ good practice?

My other option is to lay a soldier course of blocks perpendicular to the house and angle them down away from the house to create a channel and then a gully to collect the water and pipe off to a soakaway.

Another option, is to line the front of the house with these http://www.drainstore.com/aco-raindrain-c83.html and drain to a soakaway,but is this overkill? it's certainly more expensive.

Any thought would be much appreciated, total area of drive is approx. 30m2.

If the slope is not too aggressive you can simply lay the 2 or 3 courses touching the house with a gentle fall away from the building. Then you create a sort of natural gulley for the water to run along.

This however will not work if there is a large volume of water/ too big a fall coming the other way so if you drive is particularly big or very short (meaning the 150mm fall is actually quite a gradient) then i would go for the channel drain.

Just re-read your post and the soldier course you mentioned is what i mean. If you are just using 100x200 or similar you would want more than one soldier course. I would try and form the 'gulley' around 80cm from the house.

r896neo said:

This however will not work if there is a large volume of water/ too big a fall coming the other way so if you drive is particularly big or very short (meaning the 150mm fall is actually quite a gradient) then i would go for the channel drain.

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Thanks for the reply.

The gradient is approx. 1:35, blocks are std 100x200x50mm.

i would go with a linear drain. there are cheaper alternatives to teh aco ones

+1 for the linear drain. 1:50 is probably the cut off for me.