If you have been engaged to complete work for Melbourne Water, you must adhere to the relevant safety procedures.

River Detectives is a free, fun and flexible statewide citizen science program designed for schools.

Before you start building, renovating or sub-dividing, make sure your plans meet our criteria for flood, water asset and waterway protection.

Building surveyors and councils won’t issue a building permit unless you have our written approval to work or build near our assets such as pipes, drains and water mains.

Before you apply to councils for a town planning or building permit, you must find out if your property is near or within any Melbourne Water easements or assets – such as drains, sewers or water mains.

If we need ‘as constructed’ plans for the asset near your property, you’ll need to engage a licensed surveyor and Service Detection Locators to prove its location.

Works near, on or above our assets must meet our technical requirements.

You must include preliminary plans and supporting documents that outline your proposed work when applying for approval to connect to our stormwater system.

As a community, we value our rivers and creeks and consider them to be important environmental and recreational assets. However this was not always the case in the past.​

Apply for a stormwater harvesting licence to connect to a stormwater drain, watercourse or open channel, or harvest stormwater from a waterway managed by Melbourne Water.