Regulations around changing ground levels between gardens

[Jodie Murray]

Hi All, my neighbour is lowering the level of his land by around 600mm along the bottom fence, to take away the gradient. Obviously this will impact on our garden, particularly the godfathers and fence. They have said they will replace the fence and give us 3 feet of the boundary land, which seemed like a great win for us, but if they cut away without a retaining wall, we are still going to have slippage. They plan to do a small hill of soil around 2’ deep to reduce slippage, but do I need to get proper calcs done? I think it needs a wall. Is there a rule, regulation governing this? I know about the right to support, which is obvs why they are offering to give us the strip of land, but that will be useless if it slips and takes some of our existing garden with it.

 

[Jodie Murray]

Just an update, some of the brush has been cleared away today and it looks like it’s around a meter that will be taken away.

 

[stevie888]

3ft out for 2ft up will give you a 33degree slope. That will be pretty stable so I wouldn't worry. Get it well grassed: the roots will bind the surface together and stop water erosion.

Not clear what you mean by small hill though.

 

[mattylad]

A photo says a lot more than a description can

 

[^woody^]

There are no regulations. Just the common law right of support you mention, and sometimes a covenant in the property deeds.

 

[Jodie Murray]

Thank you all. The slope is what I meant by a small hill, I just couldn’t think how to word it properly. If a 2’ deep slope, at a 33d gradient will prevent slippage, that will do it. Where the drop is over 3’, we can reduce the height of the garden on our side, as that small area is about à foot higher than our main garden. Thank you so much for your help. Looks like we are gaining quite a bit of garden!
Apologies for no photo, but you can’t really tell anything from our side and I didn’t want to take a photo of their garden.