# Storm Drain Replacement and New Drainage Installation

Storm drain replacement and installation covers putting in new private drainage or replacing a run that is beyond repair: catch basins, area drains, trench drains, downspout collection, and the buried pipe carrying it all to a discharge point that can actually take it. The design question comes before the pipe question, always.

- New area drains, trench drains, and catch basins.
- Downspout collection and buried discharge lines.
- Full replacement of runs beyond repair.
- Catchment sized before pipe is specified.
- Discharge point confirmed viable before work starts.

## When Is New Drainage the Right Answer?

When water has somewhere it needs to go and no path to get there. A window well that floods, a below-grade entry that ponds, a lawn that holds water for days after a storm, or a downspout discharging against a foundation are all problems that buried drainage solves properly.

It is not always the right answer. Water sitting against a foundation because the ground slopes toward the house is a grading problem, and correcting the grade fixes it more cheaply and more permanently than installing pipe to carry away water that should never have arrived. We will tell you when that is the case.

- Window wells and areaways that flood in storms.
- Downspouts discharging at the foundation.
- Low areas that hold water for days.
- Patios and driveways that shed water toward a building.
- Existing runs crushed or silted beyond economic repair.
- New hardscape that has changed where water goes.

## How the Discharge Point Decides the Design

Water has to leave. On a sloping site that can mean daylighting the line to a lower point on the property, which is the simplest and most reliable option. On a flat site there may be no lower point, and then the choices narrow to a connection into a public storm system where one is available and permitted, or a dry well sized to absorb the volume.

Each of those has limits. Daylighting needs fall. A storm connection needs both proximity and permission. A dry well needs soil that will actually absorb, which in much of the metro's clay it will not at the rate people assume. Establishing which of these is genuinely available comes before anything is designed.

- Daylight to a lower point: needs continuous fall across the run.
- Public storm connection: needs availability and permission.
- Dry well: needs soil with real absorption capacity.
- Existing private run: needs spare capacity in that run.

## How a Drainage Installation Runs

1. **Walk the site and define the catchment** Where the water comes from, how much surface feeds each point, and where it currently ends up.
2. **Establish the discharge** Confirm a viable, legal, and physically capable place for the water to go before designing anything upstream of it.
3. **Design and size** Collection points positioned where the water actually sits, pipe sized to the catchment, fall set across the whole run.
4. **Install, test, restore** Trench, bed, lay to grade, connect, water test, then compacted backfill and surface restoration.

## What Drives Installation Cost

Run length, number of collection points, surface type across the route, and what the discharge solution has to be. A short daylight run across open turf is a modest project. A long run across finished hardscape ending in a dry well is a substantially larger one.

The cost that surprises people is restoration, not pipe. Cutting and replacing concrete, pavers, and mature planting is frequently the larger share of a drainage installation on a finished property.

Call (720) 935-6221 and we will look at where the water goes before quoting where the pipe goes.

## Frequently asked questions

**Can I connect my new drainage into the sanitary sewer?**

No. Storm water in a sanitary system consumes treatment capacity and causes backups downstream, and it is prohibited across the metro. Where we find an existing illicit connection we tell the owner, because it is a real compliance exposure as well as a technical problem.

**Do dry wells work in Denver soil?**

Sometimes, and less often than they are sold. Much of the metro sits on clay soils with low infiltration rates, and a dry well in tight clay fills during the storm and then drains slowly for days, which means it has no capacity when the next storm arrives. We test rather than assume.

**Is a French drain the same as a storm drain?**

No. A French drain is a perforated pipe in gravel that collects water from the soil around it. A storm drain collects water from the surface through grates and basins. They solve different problems, and properties frequently need one when they have been sold the other.

**Will new drainage fix water in my basement?**

It can, where the water is arriving because surface water is ponding against the building. It will not, where the water is coming through the slab or the walls from a high water table. Establishing which is happening comes before any pipe goes in the ground.

**Are you the city stormwater department?**

No. Denver Sewer and Water is a private, family owned and operated company. We are not Denver Water or the City and County of Denver. We work on the privately owned storm drainage on your property. The public system in the street belongs to the municipality.

## Related Storm Drain Services

- [Storm Drains in Denver](https://www.denversewerandwater.com/storm-drains/denver-co) The full storm drainage lane: inspection, cleaning, repair, and replacement.
- [Storm Drain Excavation](https://www.denversewerandwater.com/storm-drains/storm-drain-excavation) Machine work to expose, replace, and re-grade buried storm drainage.
- [Storm Drain Repair](https://www.denversewerandwater.com/storm-drains/storm-drain-repair) Fixing collapsed, offset, root-bound, and separated storm drain runs.
- [Storm Drain Maintenance](https://www.denversewerandwater.com/storm-drains/storm-drain-maintenance) Scheduled cleaning and inspection that keeps a private storm system working.

---

Denver Sewer and Water is a privately owned, licensed and insured plumbing contractor. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Denver Water, the municipal water utility, or any government entity. To pay a municipal water bill or reach the public utility, visit denverwater.org.

Source: https://www.denversewerandwater.com/storm-drains/storm-drain-replacement-installation