If you have a kerbside drain outside your house...

[GrouachMacbeth]

If you have a kerbside drain outside your house, and it gets blocked, or leaves accumulate around d it, do you clear it as much as you can or do you leave it - it's the councils job and I'm too pretty to clean drains.

Obviously I'm not talking about ridding and plunging a blockade deep in a drain, but maybe poking with a broom handle.

YABU - it's to councils job, I'm too pretty clean a drain.
YANBU - of course I'll try to clear the drain as much as I can, I understand councils are cash strapped.

I'd clear some leaves or rubbish out of the grate yes.

I have one of these on my road. Me and my neighbours regularly clear it. We also weed and trim plants that grow out of the wall because they could scratch the cars if not. It's no bother and takes 5-30 mins.

Yes, definitely. Have done this.

May not be my responsibility but if it is blocked and a large puddle forms, it is the front of my house that is immediately affected.

I leave it. Mainly because otherwise I'd be out there trying to unblock it every day. Even when the council come and unblock it properly it overflows the next time it rains. The problem of using Victorian infrastructure in a street that holds dozens more households than it was built to support.

Yes, well DH did yesterday because the road was in danger of flooding.

I'm always litter picking plastic crap out of the drains near here.

I’ve been known to clear gullies that are blocked with leaves and twigs when I’m out and about and it’s raining and a puddle is forming.

If a gully is full of silt and debris and causing puddles you should report it to the council

Yes I regularly clear drains. We’re rural and nobody else ever comes. It’s really not difficult or time consuming to clear leaves etc.

I leave it for the council if anything beyond the very obvious- I did once remove a plastic bag covering the entire grate, but that’s as far as I’m willing to go. Nothing to do with being pretty, it’s just that road maintenance is not my job and I’m not poking anything down there. I have phoned them when the drain was blocked and causing a significant puddle on the highway and they came out with their truck and vacuumed it out, which was much more effective than anything I could have done.

I wouldn’t risk it personally…

I can't vote because your choices for voting are loaded and therefore unreasonable.

I never lift the grate but regularly clear leaves off the top. We have a lot of trees locally and if I didn't do it my garden would flood when it rains heavily.

If it’s flooding your property you’d be a fool not to, otherwise I’d leave it.

We clear it as much as possible because our road is prone to flooding.

I've not long come back from walking DC2 to school and have just cleared the kerbside drains outside my house. The road was flooded and water was ankle deep. I only moved the leaves/rubbish that were covering/surrounding the drains (there's no way I would lift rain covers!): it didn't take me long at all and within five minutes, the road was clear again. The DC and I do a litter pick on the road outside our house every so often, but I think I'll make sure we do that weekly.

I do and I regularly clean it. I also brush the pavement and give it a little gently jet wash. If they let me I'd happy jet wash the town Square paving for free.

I reported it to the council they came out 2 days later and unblocked it.

Edit to add: I should mention it was built up with soil and silt run off from the road blocking in the drain so I wouldn't have been able to do anything to fix it.

The council clears drains round here regularly. Dh and dd1 who work from home would say too regularly. It's very noisy.

We don't here but did in our old house. I had a bit of copper pipe about a metre long that I had especially for that purpose - I don't know where it came from, I think when we put a new radiator in, I didn't buy it for that but just kept it for that because it was perfect. It was so satisfying I would do the one over the road and sometimes one up the road too.

We have weekly street cleaning here so would never need to clean it ourselves

We would clean it ourselves if possible. Otherwise, report it to the council and hope for the best.

We already cut the verges because otherwise it wouldn’t get done.

Nothing to do with cash strapped councils, it's a 5 minute job to sweep the leaves away so it's not blocked so if I need to do it, I do.

I clean mine every time I wash the car.......which can be a few weeks in-between.

I don't have a drain nearby but I do clear any I see blocked. I litter pick the street every week before bin day. Our council won't clean the drains they say to contact the water company who say it's the councils responsibility. In other words nobody wants to do it.

I haven't seen a council gulley sucker for ages
I'd be inclined to hook out the rubbish