OT - Driveway Drainage

Hoping to draw on the wealth of experience here.

My parents house is built sideways into a hill with the slop going from east to west across the front of it. Because of this the contractor that added the garage on 25 years ago had trouble getting the drive to slope away from the garage and be level with the road on the east side. With a heavy rain they get some water in the garage.

A contractor wants to remove the first ten feet of the driveway in front of the garage and repour it in a V with the dip going from the east corner by the garage to the west corner of the remaining driveway. This will give it a path to drain away, but I don't think there is enough of a grade difference to handle the volume of water.

I was thinking to just cut out the concrete in front of the garage and add a channel drain that moves the water to the west. The concern voiced here is that the channel drain will just freeze up and not drain during the winter. This is NE Kansas so I don't think that will be a problem as not much water should be in it at any given time.

What are your thoughts? I will try to draw a picture and upload it if my verbal imagery is not clear. Thanks in advance.

Picture drawing would help.

Having somewhat the same problem helping a neighbor place a mobile home pad.
He wanted it in the lowest spot in the field against my recommendation he poured the pad. Now he wants to drain the area (is a pond right now) with a pipe, bad idea, as he has the room to move a lot of dirt and let it surface drain. A pipe will eventually fail/plug
If your guy will guarantee in writing positive drainage go for it. If your going to have everything tore up anyway maybe do both.

If there are eves on the house putting water on the drive, Put eve troughs across that section, and put its flow into a dry well 6 feet away from the corner. dug below frost level at the bottom, and 3 feet in diameter with soil barrier on the outside and 3 inch rocks filling it it will take that water easily. If the pitch of the intended Flattened V diagonal is 1/2 " per 10 feet, and if the soil/grass where the "V" ends is still down hill that much or more, it will work. Jim

I've installed trench drains in similar applications in MA. with out a freezing problem. You could install thermal tape in the concrete and turn it on if there ever is a overflow of ice.

A channel drain across the drive will work fine. If it freezes, the driveway will be frozen too,no water is going to flow anyway. Do not put a P trap in the line just let it dump,the eves on my house all drain out and dump in the yard(good drop) and they don t freeze.

Is the driveway on the south side of the house or on the north side? Sunshine on a drive can make a big difference on how fast ice melts.

Thanks for the input.

The drive is on the north side of the garage.

(quoted from post at 14:08:25 11/08/16) Thanks for the input.

The drive is on the north side of the garage.

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just be careful cutting the concrete and installing the drain after the fact.

I just had a driveway installed in front of my garage, and they put drains in front of my doors.

two things they told me they do:
1- put the drains a few feet out from the door. in the event of a massive downpour, it does not puddle at the garage door, but a few feet away.
2- they made the concrete around the drains incredibly thick. I mean the concrete around my drains is probably over a foot thick in certain places. if you cut existing concrete it is never going to be that thick around the drains, so you may have to watch for cracking. I've seen driveways near my house done the same way.

in order to mirror the installations I have seen around me, you would need to bust up approx. 3' out from garage. in the center of that dig the drain "ditch" to place the drain in. in my driveway they allowed for a min of 8" concrete under the drain. so my concrete is 14" thick around the drain.

also, as far as pipe failing. I've had my gutters and French drains run thru underground pipe for probably 40 years (long before I owned the place) and there has never been an issue with water and any freezing. this is in PA.

what about adding a speed bump of sort at an angle to divert the water off to the side?