Yard Drainage in Lancaster, PA

Soggy lawns, standing puddles and runoff toward the foundation are common in Lancaster, where heavy clay soil and summer storms slow drainage down. We look at the grade, the downspouts and the soil, then recommend the simplest fix that will hold up.

Signs the water is not leaving your yard

Most yard drainage problems show up slowly. A patch of lawn stays soft two days after rain. Puddles sit in a low spot long enough to grow algae. Mulch washes out of the beds and onto the walk every storm. None of these is urgent on its own, but each one tells you where water is going and where it gets stuck.

Walk the yard during a heavy rain or right after one. That is when you can see the problem most clearly. Look for:

• Puddles still there a full day after the rain stops
• Water running across the lawn toward the foundation instead of away from it
• Bare, rutted strips where runoff has cut a path
• Moss, mushrooms or a sour smell in shaded, soggy areas
• Downspouts emptying onto soil right next to the house
• A damp crawlspace or basement wall on the same side as the wet ground

What usually causes it

Yard drainage problems come from a short list of causes, and most yards have more than one.

We check the grade first. Soil around a house should fall away from the foundation, but it settles over time, especially the backfill pushed against the walls when the house was built. A slope that was right when the house was new can now tip back toward it.

Soil type comes next. Much of Lancaster County sits on heavy soil with a lot of clay in it. Clay holds water and drains slowly, so rain that would soak into sandy ground sits on the surface instead. Newer lots often have subsoil that construction equipment packed down hard, under only a thin layer of topsoil.

Roof water is the third cause. A roof sheds a lot of water in a short time, and each downspout drops all of it in one spot. If that spot is a flower bed beside the foundation or a low corner of the yard, you get a wet area no matter how good the grade is elsewhere.

Often the water also comes from somewhere else: a neighbor's yard uphill, a driveway, or a patio poured with the wrong pitch. So we work out where the water starts, not only where it ends up.

Matching the fix to the problem

No single product fixes every wet yard. The right answer depends on how much water you have, where it comes from and where it can practically and legally go.

Regrading

Downspout drainage

Swales

French drains

Repair or replace an existing drain

If you already have drainage and the yard is wet again, you do not always have to start over. Buried downspout lines often clog at a single elbow or get crushed under a vehicle. A pop-up outlet can end up buried under mulch or sod. Those are repairs.

A French drain laid without fabric, or with the wrong gravel, tends to fill with fine clay over time. Once that happens, flushing it rarely helps for long, and replacing the trench is usually the honest answer. We will tell you which situation you are in before we recommend either one.

What a visit involves

We start by walking the property with you and asking where you see water and when. Then we check the grade with a level, see where each downspout empties, and mark the low points and possible outlets. If there is existing drainage, we run water through it to see where it goes.

Next we explain what we think is happening and lay out the options, from the simplest to the most involved. You get a written scope, so you can compare it, think it over and ask questions. We would rather you choose a smaller fix that works than a bigger one you do not need.

Before any digging, underground utilities are marked through Pennsylvania's one-call system. When the work is done, we put topsoil and seed down on the ground we disturbed.

Yard drainage in Lancaster

Lancaster weather is hard on yards. Summer storms can drop more rain in an hour than clay soil can absorb. In winter, repeated freezing and thawing heaves the soil and can shift shallow pipe. In spring, snowmelt on frozen ground has nowhere to go except across the surface.

The local houses bring their own problems. Rowhomes and twins in the city have small yards, shared walls and little room to move water, so downspout routing and careful grading do most of the work. Older stone and brick farmhouses outside town often sit in spots where water has collected for a very long time. Newer developments built on former farmland tend to have compacted fill, and the grading was often set to suit the builder's schedule rather than the long term.

Parts of the county also sit on limestone bedrock, where sending a lot of water to one spot can cause trouble. We keep that in mind when we decide where a drain or downspout line lets out, and we favor outlets that spread the water out rather than a single hole in the ground.