What is a watercourse?

A watercourse is a river, stream, ditch (whether dry or not), pond, drain, culvert or pipe through which water may flow.

The types of watercourse are:

• Main river - These are supervised by the Environment Agency and the Upper Medway Internal Drainage Board.
• Ordinary Watercourse - All other rivers, streams and ditches fall under this category.

Exceptions to this are:

• Highway drains
• Culverts under public roads
• Piped roadside ditches.
• Other drainage which has been specifically built to drain the highway.

These are maintained by the Highway Authority.

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