Every time it rains the space between my house and the neighbor’s turns into a river. Any way to fix this on a budget? Sand, pebbles, rocks, plants? My neighbor has no interest in helping me, l've asked. His side also gets a ton of weeds which makes keeping my side weed free very difficult. I have gutters as well. Any advice is appreciated.
by WhatCanLifeBe
33 Comments
Definitely need somewhere for the water to travel away from your foundation otherwise your sump pump will do double duty. If you don’t have a sump pump then chances are your foundation may leak at some point.
Dig a small trench and lay medium/large landscape river rocks and see how it goes the next time it rains.
Good luck.
Is that his drain pipe that’s making the river? He needs to turn it & extend it toward the back of your property instead of down toward your house
Your neighbor is dumping it straight to your lawn.
After the rain, How long does it take for the water to dissipate?
If it’s taking days, thats a problem.
If it’s within 24 hours, It’s not a problem.
That looks like it is doing its job. It looks like a trench that moves heavy rain water away from the house to the street .
That area between the houses looks like it’s designed to be a drainage swale and carries water to the front of the property. Definitely doesn’t help that your neighbors downspout is pointing towards you though.
Crimp the end of your neighbor’s downspout.
Given the area is likely more utility, I would probably dig it out , add some drainage , and do the chip and dust + paver look along the side.
Note this line. Either dig in a trench and line it with drainage material and cover back with grass, or get river rock for that low point.
It appears this is how that neighborhood arranged its water drainage.
Neighbors gutters drain right to your property line!
That’s called a moat and some people pay big bucks for that
See that valley ya have in the back? Send it there
Underground drainage pipe from the downspout that’s connected into a pop-up emitter perhaps?
Turn the extended gutter down the hill or fill the area with rocks
Looks like it has good slop to the front and the back? Add more dirt in the middle so water flows to either direction and does not get held
Neighbor should redirect his downspout. As long as there’s proper slope though it shouldn’t really be a problem. If water stands or accumulates then it needs fixing.
I would make a dry creek bed the length of the yard. Although most of the dip belongs to your neighbor I think.
I would trench that up so you can put in a drain system there. I would also see about getting the downspout into a PVC pipe attached to that drainage system so it doesn’t pool there.
Run the underground pipe out to the street.
Because there is a transformer there I would be very careful about digging around there. Get 811 to come out and mark all lines and then dig gently just in case.
looks like your on the higher ground. If your neighbor doesn’t care I wouldn’t either.
A trench with perf. pipe and gravel sloping towards the back would be the solution if it were to be addressed.
Following because I have a situation I’m working on that slightly resembles this
You don’t. That’s a swale, it’s meant for flood water — albeit your neighbor built their fence in it.
Routine fertilizer should take care of the weeds. Just set a wider broadcast so you hit their lawn a little when you do yours. Problem solved.
Your downspout might not be compliant, if it’s directing water into someone else’s yard. But I’m not code compliance so it is what it is.
Burried perforated drain tile bedded in stone would do the trick.
Drainage pipe and aeration. Then again I am super new at this lawn stuff.
get a long piece of solid ADS drain pipe to tie onto that gutter and run it toward the back of the property in the mean time.. then maybe in spring put it underground, that would most likely solve 90% of it it
It looks like you’re on a hill? Maybe divert the water down there IF no one’s down there. But it does seem like the city plan for that area to collect water and move it from there. Another “solution” would be planting bush that does very well in that type of environment.
I had the same problem as this and it was an easy fix but a lot of labor. I recommend hiring someone unless you really have the time to do it.
I rented a trench digger where the “river” is in your photo. I put a drain right in the middle of that low area in front of each gutter. In the trench, I ran a 4 inch PVC pipe all the way to the curb at the street, and I literally cut a hole in the side of the curb for the PVC.
[Like this](https://i.imgur.com/Q5aNWyA.jpeg)
I’m not home at the moment but [here is a pic of the curb](https://i.imgur.com/sz4DyWm.jpeg).
Looks like exactly what is suppose to happen is happening. Just geussing, but it looks like the rainwater on your side of the street is suppose to drain to the back of your lots. If there’s a storm ditch or some sort of catch basin back there, that would confirm this. Possible it’s ment to be just a holding pond back there aswell. Otherwise everything would be graded to drain forward to the storm system on your street.
If the water is standing for too long you could just steepin’ the grade to the back of your lot to get your swale to drain a bit faster, but you should check your bylaws before commiting to anything as you may get a fine if you change things not ment to be changed. Your city/town engineers *should* (not always) have an idea of where the storm water on your yard should be going.
It’s almost like houses should not be built this close together and this little land in between is not made to absorb that much water
Dude…… Is this over near Pinnacle?
I’d bury a pipe the length of it with a drain going into it upstream and see where that gets me.
Bury a perf pipe wrapped in filter fabric and discharge through a curb cut. You could also add some elevation towards the top of the swale and increase its slope.
Redirect the downspouts.
Rain garden style landscaping with rocks and water sucking plants baby