Your downspouts are very important. They are where the water in your gutter goes and they assist in directing water away from your home or business’s foundation.
The reason why it is so important for you to keep your gutters and your downspouts maintained is so you do not have inadequate or incorrect drainage occurring. Water that is allowed to pool around a foundation can infiltrate that foundation and cause leaks into the basement. It also aids in the formation of even larger cracks that can compromise the integrity of the structure. In other words, repairs can be rather expensive when they are needed.
Even water that pools in the yard can cause damage to your landscaping and that may result in a whole other set of problems.
But what you may not know is that your downspouts play an important role in your water quality.
You can actually turn your downspouts toward your yard or plant beds rather than your driveway, if possible. If you can do so without hurting your yard or you can create a completely new channel for drainage, you are protecting the cleanliness of the water supply. You can create rain gardens, plant beds and berms, put rain barrels in place, and much more to make use of the water coming from your downspout. Just make sure you don’t turn it toward your neighbor’s house or you may have an irritated neighbor.
You can also make sure that pet waste and grass clippings are blown off of the lawn so that any water that may make it to the storm drain does not carry those things with it.
In addition to maintaining your downspout and keeping a clean lawn, you can adopt the storm drain in front of your house. If you adopt the storm drain, you simply keep it free from leaves, twigs, and other garbage so that the water does not back up into the street. If flooding is severe, water backup could even back into your house, so it is important to help keep these areas clean.
