Learn me yard grading, drainage, etc

So, my lawn is a nightmare, with a side order of rotting retaining wall and a bonus of poor drainage starting to affect the house.

Here's what I'm dealing with -

• In red are 12" galvanized culverts. The one that goes under my front yard drains the north side yard into the south side yard, and another culvert ~20' away takes the water under the street / away. The inlet to the culvert that is on my land is at the end of a rotting railroad tie retaining wall. The current wall goes from ~7' high at the house to ~2' where it terminates at the culvert.

• In orange is a rough idea for a terraced replacement wall that steps down, looks nicer, adds character, includes planting beds, etc.

• In yellow shows areas that currently drain poorly. The worst is the one closest to the culvert - it stays a pond for several days after a rain. I'd guess the low spot there is a good 4-6" below the elevation of the culvert inlet. The other spots are probably higher than the inlet, but drain poorly due to grading. The northern spot doesn't puddle, but does become saturated, such that it's like walking on a wet sponge. The are closest to the house does puddle for days and that corner of the house is showing some rot. Obviously that needs to be fixed, but I want to dry the area first.

The big X-Factor is just how much total elevation I have between the slab and the culvert inlet. I know that in theory, with proper grading, water will flow to the inlet. What I don't know is if I have enough elevation to make that happen. The time factor is that the retaining wall is on it's way out and I don't want to build a new one on top of a swamp, so I need to stabilize the side yard before I do anything to the wall. At least that's my assumption.

1. What kind of company deals with this? I've got a landscaper, but he's a grass guy. I assume I need someone with bobcats and such. As his total english comprehension is barely more than "I will pay you $60 for cutting the grass", I'm not ready to dive into a real project with him regardless.

2. What is "enough" elevation to get decent drainage?

3. If I don't have enough elevation, I've considered a couple of options - drain pit with a lift pump to pump to the culvert, or rebury the culvert deeper. Obviously I'd like to avoid either of these, but if I need to choose, which option is right? Is there another?

Also, if anyone wants to weigh in on the retaining wall, hit me. My current thought is poured concrete with a stacked stone veneer, but that's not set in stone. I'd like to do it once and do it right, but not spend more than I have to. I'm assuming that concrete is the forever solution versus a stacked product, but feel free to learn me.

Here is how I would solve this problem. Proper drainage should be achieved during construction. Good Luck

Seriously though can you make a drawing with <<<< elevation markers? It looks like on the North (UP) side you have a walkout basement however your talking about the water draining towards the driveway so I am confused as usually driveways/garages are on the first floor of a house and walkouts are below that. Is the North High or Low and is the woods High or low.

I do have a walkout basement - Drive out even (that's where my shop is). But I drive across the lawn to get there right now. The culvert carries the water from the side yard under my front yard and driveway, which leads to the main floor garage.

The front yard, the street, the north end of the side yard, and the west end of the side yard are all higher elevations. So the side yard is a big bowl.

More pics -

Just go with it. Dig down a few more feet, add a liner, stock it with bream.

Or:

plus

And call me and the Hongs when it is ready. We'll bring the beer.

In reality, it looks like a french drain might work. Is there a creekbed or something the tree line behind the house?

And yes - Massive shop could be in play at some point, but as with the wall construction, I don't want to build on a swamp.

slefain wrote: In reality, it looks like a french drain might work. Is there a creekbed or something the tree line behind the house?

Yes there is a creek bed behind the house. There is a 6' tall hill between the low spot and the creek though. In theory, there was a french drain installed at some point, but that was either hearsay or it has long ago failed. And while I'm not opposed to using underground drainage to supplement, it seems like it's a losing battle as long as the surface water won't flow off the land.

DILYSI Dave wrote:

slefain wrote: In reality, it looks like a french drain might work. Is there a creekbed or something the tree line behind the house?

Yes there is a creek bed behind the house. There is a 6' tall hill between the low spot and the creek though. In theory, there was a french drain installed at some point, but that was either hearsay or it has long ago failed. And while I'm not opposed to using underground drainage to supplement, it seems like it's a losing battle as long as the surface water won't flow off the land.

I just re-dug a long drainage ditch beside the neighbor's house where a french drain had been installed. Once I scraped down to the gravel level the drain started working great again.

The drain has probably silted over and will have to be opened up again. I'd dig a trench from the middle of the bowl, straight through that hill and to the creek bed. I'd let a pro do that though. Oddly the best trench digger I've ever seen was a septic tank company.

I suppose that's an option. I wouldn't want to go with the gravel / holy pipe / "let it sink in" method, but I could do a pit at the low spot with an iron grate, and a culvert running away from it, dumping into the creek. At that point, the current culvert would be superfluous. Could cap it and bury it.

My civil engineer friend told me 1 foot in 10 is what you want for drainage.

Dr. Hess wrote: My civil engineer friend told me 1 foot in 10 is what you want for drainage.

There is no way I have that between the slab and the culvert. The unmeasured, pulled out of my ass numbers are guessing that I have 15" +/- over an 80' span.

He said 1 in 10 for 10 ft around your house (shop) and you should be OK.

french drains have been known to surrender

I played around and played around with all kinds of solutions but nothing worked till I pulled out the bobcat.

Go big or go home with your solutions. Little attempts will take you forever before you end up with the obvious bigger solution.

carguy123 wrote: Go big or go home with your solutions. Little attempts will take you forever before you end up with the obvious bigger solution.

The "big solution" I have in mind (which, BTW, my wife thinks I'm insane for) is to dig up the culvert (including taking out part of the driveway) that drains the side yard, and rebury it a foot or so deeper, and grade the yard to reflect that new reality.

I am confident that it would make for a dry yard. I'm also scared to ponder how many thousands of dollars it will cost to do that.

Do you have a septic field? Is it anywhere near the saturated area of the yard?

EastCoastMojo wrote: Do you have a septic field? Is it anywhere near the saturated area of the yard?

Septic - yes
Field - Pretty sure no. The septic tank is behind the house (west). Pretty sure the septic field drains away from the house to the west / south. There's no smell associated with the standing water. It's entirely related to rainfall. If I get a good 7-10 day dry spell, the side yard completely dries out and I can drive on it. But with rain like we've had, it's a swamp.

The swampy areas: spread sand over them but not so thick it kills the grass, rake it down so the blades stick through and can get sunlight. Let the grass grow through, repeat. Might take a few years but it works. You can speed this up a bit by mixing fertilizer with the sand.

The rest of it you can also do yourself, dig a 'swale' pointing the water the way you want it to go. If you do this, you need to have grass in there quick so that it doesn't turn into a gully. That means sod.

By the way: is that the Snot Rocket on the trailer in the first picture?

Yes - The Snot Rocket can be seen from space.

DILYSI Dave wrote: The "big solution" I have in mind (which, BTW, my wife thinks I'm insane for) is to dig up the culvert (including taking out part of the driveway) that drains the side yard, and rebury it a foot or so deeper, and grade the yard to reflect that new reality.

That or install a new culvert running to the creek. Either one is going to require a lot of digging and be expensive. I would find an excavation contractor and get estimates for both ways.

DILYSI Dave wrote:

I'm also scared to ponder how many thousands of dollars it will cost to do that.

No, you are looking at this all wrong it's "how many hours of fun" you are going to have!! I learned how to use a tractor & skid loader and had a world of fun. I reshaped earth for the longest and had a blast doing it. I made gullies, filled in gullies, dug ponds (and that's a great idea for your low spot), smoothed earth, moved dirt, hauled stuff and generally just had a great time.

carguy123 wrote:

DILYSI Dave wrote:

I'm also scared to ponder how many thousands of dollars it will cost to do that.

No, you are looking at this all wrong it's "how many hours of fun" you are going to have!! I learned how to use a tractor & skid loader and had a world of fun. I reshaped earth for the longest and had a blast doing it. I made gullies, filled in gullies, dug ponds (and that's a great idea for your low spot), smoothed earth, moved dirt, hauled stuff and generally just had a great time.

I've had enough fun on a tractor. At this point it's just bullE36 M3 house maintenance.

So you know how easy and fast it would be to solve your problem, so what's stopping you? It definitely wouldn't take thousands of dollars.

Got one of those spinning laser level thingies? and a yard stick? You can do GRM style surveying. You might have to do it at night with the laser not being very visible in direct sunlight.