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What to do with old drain tile?

bdeboer | Posted in General Discussion on April 4, 2007 09:05am

As part of another deal we may get a lot in the small town near where we live.

Until a recent fire there was an over 3,000 sg. ft. 75 plus year old home on the lot.  The nearby houses are well maintained etc.

I talked to the excavator who was doing the demolition, and having trouble filling the hole because of ground water coming in about halfway down the old basement walls.  What he found was an old flat bottom clay tile that had been cutoff at some point to repair/ add the basement after the house was built.  The tile comes from at least two lots behind it.  He also found the tile (it is plugged) between the basement heading under the street.  There is no storm drain on this section of street.  When the old house was there, the sump pump would pump the water from the basement into the backyard.  The “village officials” told him to plug the tile and pump the water into the curb and let it run into a catch basin 150′ away.  He plugged the tile temporarily to get the hole filled.  There is no easement for this tile.

What responsibility does someone have for repairing/maintaining this tile?  

A couple of the neighbors have shown interest in the lot and it may remain vacant if the $ are right.

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  1. User avater
    Matt | Apr 05, 2007 04:57am | #1

    You say there is not an easement for the tile so it would seem to me that you could dig it up at the 2 property lines and pour it full of concrete.  Other than that, based on the old basement and the drainage situation, as a SWAG add $6 to $15k to the cost of the foundation for a new house.  BTW - Did the demo contractor get the old foundation completely out? 

    1. bdeboer | Apr 05, 2007 03:19pm | #4

      He did remove everything including the footers, were you wondering if he buried the "clean" fill?  I believe the property owner with the two lots directly behind this will cooperate as far as an easement to the adjacent street, because this tile crosses both of his lots.

      Edited 4/5/2007 8:23 am ET by bdeboer

  2. dovetail97128 | Apr 05, 2007 06:23am | #2

    No Answer but I do have a story for yoiu .

    I grew up just west of Cleveland Oh.

    House and neighborhood were built in 1912.
    Area had been a vineyard before the homes were built.
    In the mid fifties during a heavy summer rainstorm the basement wall of our house bulged in about 12", and two doors up the entire basement blew in , flooded the hole several ft. deep.

    Both house had the usual clay drain tiles installed as foundaton drains , tied to city storms sewers.

    The cause of the problem turned out to be long abandoned field drain tiles that had been routed to collection points and then originally drained out to day light.

    When the homes were built if field tiles were found they were simply cut and cement plugs put in them ... but nothing was ever done to prevent the original system from collecting water , nor to allow it to drain it away.

    Heavy rains for several days, followed by one extremely heavy storm overlaoded the capacity of the field tiles and they dumped all their water into the old collection tiles , which just happened to have been cut right outside our and our neighbors basements.

    My advice, plan on a way to deal with the water.

    1. bdeboer | Apr 05, 2007 03:14pm | #3

      This is in central ohio, and you pretty much hit the nail on the head with my concerns about what could happen if we plug the tile w/bentonite or concrete.  The lot directly behind it which tile crosses does have access to side street which supposedly has a storm sewer.

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