Dr. Daryl Styner and her husband have lived in Westport for over 42 years. She was a professor in a doctoral program in dentistry before retiring. She writes:
After the September 13 deluge, concerns have been heightened for residents who live near new builds all over town.
Demolished homes are being replaced with much larger structures. Many are at maximum coverage on lots both small and large.
Neighbors who up to now have not had water problems now incur significant water run-off from these new structures. In many neighborhoods (like mine in the Long Lots area),we are paying for expensive “fixes,” because builders and town engineers under-estimate the drainage needs for these new builds.
With changes in our weather patterns, and the volume of water hitting our area, maybe it is time for building officials to re-think the formulas used to determine how much drainage and what kind of land grading is needed to adequately redirect water run-off, and what types of drainage systems are being used.
Long after the rain ended.
In 2017, an original 1950’s house on Long Lots Road was demolished and replaced with a new home, whose structure is easily 3-4 times the size of its predecessor.
The front to back pitch/slope of the property is significant, and an underground stream runs in this area between this house and the neighboring property on Long Lots Road.
During and very shortly after construction was finished, there were indications to both the house below (at the back of the property), and to the adjacent neighbor that water run-off was an issue, especially after any significant rain.
The adjacent neighbor eventually needed rubber boots to walk on the property. It became increasingly unusable for children to be able to play because of the “new” grading redirecting water run-off to their backyard.
Long after rain stops, water remains.
They got no accountability from the town, nor the builder, or the homeowners who purchased this new build. These neighbors had to lay out significant dollars to remedy this problem with additional drainage, regrading and plantings, just to get back the use of their own backyard.
The other house below them, a new build in 2004-5, had major beefed-up drainage systems built-in to this structure, but has eventually seen increasingly overwhelming water run-off into their driveway after big rains.
A building site near Daryl Styner’s home. The weight of the contents are pushing against a barrier that is not supposed to cross onto her property. In a big rain, mud will course onto her land and driveway, washing out all the aeration, topsoiling and reseeding they’ve done.
Significant water pools at the back end like a lake, which during heavy rain then overflows through mature Norway spruce trees into the driveway of the house below them, and sometimes overwhelming the storm drain as well.
This same torrent of water spills onto our property, flowing like a river through an entire line of mature Norway spruces.
My new neighbors (here a little over a year), are in the process of working with contractors on additional drainage solutions.
Many others have experienced this themselves, are now going through it, or know friends in nearby neighborhoods who have all experienced it as well. The consensus is that they all feel that existing owners — taxpayers — are not being protected at all.
Debris from runoff clogs storm drains.
Our town officials should have an equal responsibility to protect the adjacent properties of every new building project that comes before them. For many residents, that’s just not happening.
Drainage system plans for new builds need to be scrutinized more closely, beefed up, and closely monitored. Regrading on properties need to be scrutinized more closely and monitored.
Many builders (not all) cut corners for their bottom line. There has to be more accountability. Owners and families are being forced to pay dearly for the aftermath of their projects.
This should not be happening. This is not right.
(“06880” Opinion pages are open to all. Send submissions to 06880blog@gmail.com. To support this hyperlocal blog, please click here.)
What a shame that our town doesn’t address this problem. Additionally, the town doesn’t account for newer, higher construction destroying their neighbors’ views. Many have been totally wiped out of sun and for others, water views.
This opinion piece makes obvious ‘common sense’ but, as all Westport homeowners know, the town has only given cursory attention to the problem. The reason is simple. The main driving force for town govt. is keeping their Grand List as high as possible. A few years ago I visited Town Hall to voice my concern to the person(s) in the conservation dept. I was handed a pamphlet re: the Sasco Creek Management Area, and advised to read it. That was all they did. Next Step, we had to bring in an engineer, dig a gravity well, and install sump pumps. Overflow was managed to some extent, until last week’s rain event, when our pump system was overwhelmed from all the rainfall.
I definitely agree and want to be added as a concerned and affected individual. The flood last weekend affected a large number of people but, like Daryl, this is a problem that has been affecting me for over 10 years. It has reportedly never been an issue until houses were torn down and built in the neighborhood behind mine 20 years ago, a problem that is getting worse. i know my parents, on the other end of town, have the same issue. The water all successfully drains away from my house but when that large drain gets overwhelmed, like it did last weekend affected, the water has nowhere to go and backs up into my basement. i feel i have little recourse because i live on a private road with the drain in my driveway. However keeping up my end of the drain is not enough when run off has worsened over the decades from not only my street, but other neighborhoods as well.
This happened to us as well. Three neighbors rebuilt within the last 15 years. Each time, flooding has gotten worse. There is wetland on the back of my property which has now started expanding. When I’ve had conservation, wetland and building departments out to see, they said nothing they can do. Combined with the town’s ambivalence toward addressing culverts that are too small and/or filed with sediment, and underpowered pumps, every big rain event becomes a flood.
This falls under the purview of town engineers, conservation and flood and erosion commissions on which I was a member but felt they weren’t doing enough. I’m glad you’re speaking up but sad that your properties have flooding issues.
Thank you all for your comments and confirmation of similar shared experiences. With a new building project starting again on the other side of my property, now, I tried to reach out to Town Engineers to express my concerns about drainage, leaving a message, and never got a return call. When I tried to call back to make an appointment to speak with the Engineer evaluating the project abutting mine, the receptionist. Deb, just sent my call to voicemail. There must be some way for us to demand accountability & protection from what is happening to our real estate asset that we pay taxes to our Town for.
Thank you Dr. Stymerfor bringing painful attention to this prevalent shortcoming in town planning, conservation and building governance. Our boards and commissions have become a friend to developers, and residents are paying the price in terms of flooding, traffic, environmental degradation and more. New development has NOT kept the cost of living stable for residents as we have experienced exponentially higher rates for property tax, sewer, water, public safety and the like.
Preserving open space is more than a nicety. Diminishing open and permeable space causes flooding, reduces habitat, kills wildlife, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Westport’s miniscule 20 square miles of land is already beyond overdeveloped.
We can’t grow more open space. Preserve and protect it now or lose it forever.
We are seeing a similar runoff situation on our road, where a 2,100 sq ft antique was replaced by an 8,100 sq ft McMansion. Part of the problem seems to be that the developers were permitted to maximize the structure’s height to around 38′ (in a zone that is supposed to be limited to 26′) in part by elevating the foundation well above the natural grade, and then backfilling. Extensive drilling into rock ledge probably didn’t help the runoff situation, either. When we built a small garage a couple of years ago, the town required us to install an extensive (and expensive) drainage system under our driveway. We would expect that a similar standard was applied to our new neighbor.
Toni, Didn’t someone recently mention his property tax bill went up 29%? That’s a bit outrageous. Also, I enjoy reading your comments about different topics. You’re definitely a special person!
Excellent post and comments. I have heard similar concerns from friends and neighbors.
The situation is Westport new construction is dire. For some reason, we’re one of the few towns in this area absolutely overrun with spec builders. A spec builder’s sole concern is maximizing profit, and they make more profit by making bigger houses (especially big houses mostly composed of empty space). So they’re incentivized to build as big as possible at the lowest possible cost. Unseen items like drainage naturally fall to the wayside — even if it exposes the buyer to legal liability down the line.
We need a solution to the problem that starts with disincentivizing spec builders. Beside the drainage issue, spec building is horrible for the environment. Instead of right-sized spaces designed for owners’ actual needs and lifestyle, we have a town of enormous, poorly-built McMansions that are hugely wasteful of energy and whose building components will need to be replaced in 10-20 years at most (vinyl windows anyone?), consuming more fossil fuels and adding more to landfills. It’s the opposite of the green town Westport proclaims itself to be.
First step is to ask the neighboring property to fix their drainage to not direct water your way. If they don’t comply, you can go to court. I understand that if a neighboring property does something to their property (e.g. regrades) that redirects storm water on to your property, you can sue them for damages and/or remediation.
The way I see this is that even a property with no impermeable structure would still have caused massive amount of runoff. The rate of rainfall reached 9″/hour at some point. A healthy soil can only absorb a rate of 0.1″/hour, and eventually that soil will get saturated. So runoff would still occur even from an empty lot.
We all agree that we need to reduce runoff, and also capture more of the runoff in order to avoid flooding. We need to ask the right questions in order to find the right solutions.
There is the question of how to retain more of the water on-premise. What about the water collected from the roof and dumped above surface instead of underground storage system? Is this not contributing to more runoff when we get heavy rain? Or impermeable driveways that cannot be easily redirected to underground storage system if one exists? Maybe some solutions can be implemented, but that can take a very long time, especially because existing homes aren’t required to make changes, unless they need to get a permit for additions.
And then there is the question regarding the capacity of the town storm water infrastructure. Is it up-to-date and able to keep up, or does it need to be upgraded? For example, when the water starts flowing from a backyard like a small river, is this an indication that we are not capturing the water runoff adequately somewhere upstream?
I don’t get how this can be an issue in 2026. I understand that replacing a small structure with a massive one changes the coverage math, and clear cutting trees / regrading the yard comes with unintended consequences.
But aren’t there a ton of rules and regulations with this stuff?
20 years ago we extensively renovated what was then already a more than 100 year old home. We didn’t change the footprint, but it was entirely reskinned. With those new gutters and downspouts, came a drainage system mandated by the town that would rival MetLife Field. Every downspout was connected to a pipe underground to either a dry well, or a cistern that we used for the irrigation system. Not a single drop off the roof was unaccounted for. We had engineers, and the town had people, and it added significant cost but when it rained, boy did it work.
Is that still not a thing? There should be no “direct water your way” situation because we weren’t permitted to direct water anywhere except into a pipe that then fed an underground concrete box.
I agree that close attention needs to be paid to runoff issues but also t issues connected with extending exemptions to build further in to march areas.
I would strongly recommend the affected parties here not look to the ineffective Westport departments and go stright to the State of Connecticut DEEP and ENERGY departments to ask for their Storm Water Construction enforcement department. There are strict state and federal laws regulating storm water construction site measures and most home builders are totally unaware of these laws, regulations and required permits. The fines for lack of compliance are significant for failure to comply.
I read today’s opinion piece about runoff from new construction and am glad the issue is receiving attention. A related concern is runoff from pre-existing drainage systems, which can leave affected homeowners with little protection.
Although the Town Engineering Department says homeowners must manage runoff on their own property, Westport does not appear to have an effective process for addressing runoff from an existing system. The Town does not get involved, and affected homeowners are instead encouraged to resolve the matter directly with their neighbors.
When those discussions fail, the runoff may continue without a clear way to obtain relief or ensure that stormwater standards are followed.