Plumber Medina

Medina WA 6167, City of Kwinana. About 32 km south of the Perth CBD.

Medina sits about thirty-two kilometres south of the Perth CBD in the City of Kwinana, the first of four neighbourhood units built from the early 1950s to house workers for the new industrial area, and designed by Perth's first female town planner. Its layout runs on linked greens and walkways rather than a simple grid. For a plumber that design matters: some services run behind properties rather than along the street, and the housing above them is seventy years old.

• A planned layout with services behind the housesMedina's greens and pedestrian ways mean a water or sewer run does not always follow the road the way it does in a conventional suburb. Locating properly before excavating matters more here, because the obvious route is frequently the wrong one.
• Seventy-year-old pipeworkThis is the age at which original pipe stops failing once and starts failing repeatedly. Pressure drops, discoloured water and recurring pinhole leaks in a Medina house point at the pipework itself, not the fitting on the end of it.
• Mature trees through shared greensThe planted greens that give Medina its character are now seventy years grown, and their roots sit over ageing drainage. Roots into those earthenware joints are a common cause of the blockages we clear here.
• Renovations over untouched servicesA refitted Medina kitchen or bathroom often discharges into the original 1950s line. That is why a renovated house can still block regularly, and why a camera inspection is worth doing before clearing it again.