Beverly Hills and the Rouge running through it
Most of the water inside the Beverly Hills village limits is one thing, the main branch of the Rouge River. It comes down out of Bloomfield Township, through Birmingham and a sliver of the township, then across the village on its way to Southfield. Riverside Park sits on the Mill Pond just east of Evergreen. If your lot backs onto the river or sits in one of the low streets near it, you already know the ground there stays soft long after a storm.
Most of the village isn’t on the river, though. It’s on the flat, heavy clay that covers this part of Oakland County, and that clay causes more of our calls here than the river does.
Two building booms, two kinds of wall
The original Beverly Hills subdivision went in on Birchwood and Kirkshire in the 1920s and kept filling up through the 1950s. The area was still part of Southfield Township until 1957, when it incorporated as the Village of Westwood to keep from being absorbed by the new city of Southfield. The Beverly Hills name came a year or two later.
So you get a split. The older houses near Birchwood and Kirkshire tend to have brick or clay-tile foundations. The big wave of ranches and colonials that followed in the 1950s and 60s sits on concrete block. A lot of what we do in the village is on that block.
What clay does to a block wall
Clay holds water against the wall instead of letting it drain away. It swells when it’s wet and pulls back when it dries, and that push and pull works on the mortar joints year after year. Water gets into the hollow cores of the block, then shows up at the floor joint, sometimes in a corner, sometimes along a whole wall.
For most of these houses we’d install an interior drain along the footing, drill weep holes into the bottom row of block so the cores can drain, and run it to a sump. It’s quieter than an excavation and it doesn’t touch your landscaping. We save outside digging for walls that are bowing or for the rare case where interior work can’t reach the problem.
One honest note. If you only get water in one spot after a downpour and the downspout above it dumps right against the house, start with a ten-foot extension. Seriously. Call us if that doesn’t do it.
Backups after a big storm
In August 2014, the storm that damaged more than 100,000 homes across Macomb, Oakland and Wayne counties overloaded the drainage system in neighboring Southfield badly enough that basements backed up in homes and businesses. Beverly Hills sits right up against that same system, and the same thing can happen on your street when the mains surcharge.
- If it’s clear water seeping at the walls, that’s groundwater and it’s our waterproofing side.
- If it’s sewage coming up the floor drain, that’s the sewer, and a backwater valve on the main line is the fix.
- If you had both, you probably need both, and we’ll tell you which one to do first.
- Either way, photograph everything before cleanup. Michigan law gives you 45 days to file a written claim with the municipality if you think the public sewer was at fault.
We’re in Shelby Township, about 35 to 40 minutes from 13 Mile and Southfield Road. Estimates are free, and someone answers emergency calls at any hour.
