Draining the Swamp

Stratford Cricket Club's home ground, Victoria Park, had suffered from such poor drainage it had been dubbed ‘the Stratford swamp’ by  the club's rivals, and last year’s first-round matches all had to be played away.  The club appealed to the Stratford District Council and an agreement was reached to work together to fix the drainage problems.
Mexteds was contracted to install a 160mm collector drain through the whole length of the field. This soon revealed the full extent of the drainage issue, as water poured into the trench from the saturated subsoils. We then installed six 110mm lateral drains across the wicket block at five metre centres, before building a brand new wicket with 100mm of basecourse, 20mm of topcourse and then laid the Patumahoe clay.
​Neil Cooper of Stratford DC says "It's looking really good and I must say I was very impressed with the professionalism of Mexteds. I couldn't be happier with the way the whole thing went".   >>> More photos