Plumbing repairs and installations in Hitchin

What is Hitchin's building stock like?

Hitchin is an old market town on the River Hiz, and its centre has a large conservation area, first designated in 1969. Streets such as Tilehouse Street and Bancroft hold timber-framed houses, some of them medieval, alongside Georgian fronts and many listed buildings. Around the centre, Victorian and Edwardian terraces fill the roads towards the station, and interwar, post-war and newer estates spread out towards the edges and the villages.

How does a listed building affect plumbing repairs?

For a listed building, listed building consent can be needed for internal work as well as external, where it affects the building's special character. Running new pipes through old timbers, cutting into historic floors or removing original features are the kind of changes to raise with North Hertfordshire Council first. A straightforward repair that replaces like with like is far less likely to need consent, but if in doubt ask before work starts.

In the conservation area, new pipes or vents on a visible wall can also need thought.

Why are leaks hard to find in old Hitchin houses?

Timber-framed buildings move, and their floors and walls are rarely straight. Pipes may have been run through floor voids, behind panelling or along beams over many years of alteration. Water can follow a beam a long way before it shows, so a stain is often not near the fault. Telling the plumber which rooms sit above and below the damp patch helps.

How old is Hitchin's piped water?

Much younger than many of its buildings. The railway reached the town in 1850, and in the same year Hitchin elected a Local Board, which went on to build a waterworks and new sewers. Until then the River Hiz had served as the town's drain. So the timber-framed and Georgian houses in the centre stood for a long time before mains water and drainage reached them, and their kitchens, sinks, bathrooms and pipe runs were fitted later, wherever there was room.

That history explains a lot of what plumbers meet in the old town: bathrooms in what were once bedrooms, supply pipes entering at the back of a deep plot, waste pipes routed around beams and joints buried in later partitions. If you know roughly when your bathroom or kitchen was last refitted, mention it, as it helps the plumber guess what kind of pipework to expect. A note of where the stopcock is, if you have found it, helps too, since in older houses it is not always under the kitchen sink.

What do the Victorian terraces bring?

Many terraces have a kitchen and bathroom in a back addition, with pipes running some distance from the stopcock. Some older terraces may share a supply pipe between neighbouring houses, so a pressure problem can involve next door. Outside taps and pipes in rear outhouses are also prone to freezing in winter.

Is the water hard in Hitchin?

Yes. Water across North Herts is hard, and limescale is a common reason for dripping taps, sluggish cistern valves and showers that have lost their spray.

How do I send an enquiry from Hitchin?

Give us your SG4 or SG5 postcode and describe the fault. Should a plumber take jobs in your postcode, and with your go-ahead, the enquiry is handed to that one plumber. Should nobody work there, we say as much, and your details are not handed on.