Park Drainage Report

Inadequate drainage is a big problem in the Park, making the ground very waterlogged in places and also allowing water to run over the paths which then freezes in winter, hazardous for walkers. The Volunteers have decided to make fixing the Park drainage a priority.

So far, we have used a metal detector to find and mark the drains that exist in the Park, and have also mapped them:

Then, starting at the Maryhill Road entrance, we have been working our way up the Lime Avenue, digging out the drains and clearing or digging new gullys along the sides of the path. Some drains are in very good condition:

Others have been replaced with steel plates which have rusted in place, so we have drilled holes in the plates to allow drainage:

These should still drain well, providing they’re regularly kept clear of detritus. Other drains have been blocked with pieces of wood or concrete, we plan to swap decent gratings from little-used drains to these places where they would be more useful. Another problem is that in some places new benches have been installed with no thought to drainage – in fact in one place the tarmac appears to be over a drain. We are digging channels behind these benches to allow water to flow past.

We have mostly finished the Lime Avenue drainage, we plan to continue around the Park. We have also been investigating near the playpark, where the water regularly floods over the path. the metal detector found a drain off to the side of the path which we have dug out – it backs up and overflows in very wet weather, but drains normally most of the time, so we plan to improve the gully to this drain to prevent the path flooding in normal circumstances. In very heavy rain the path may still flood, but we have also dug a channel on the other side of the path to allow floodwater to drain off the path.