Drain Unblocking Groningen

Drain unblocking in Groningen: sand, clay and peat under one city

If you live in Groningen, you'll know how different the neighbourhoods are. Inside the Diepenring, the ring of canals around the city centre, stand centuries-old buildings that have been renovated time and again. Just beyond it are streets from around 1900; to the south, leafy post-war neighbourhoods; and along the Reitdiep and in Meerstad, homes whose first residents moved in only recently. Those differences decide where a blockage is most likely to be and which approach clears it fastest. That's why drain unblocking in Groningen starts with two questions: what kind of house do you live in, and what kind of ground does it stand on?

A sand ridge with soft edges

The heart of the city sits on the far northern tip of the Hondsrug, the sand ridge that runs up from Drenthe to Groningen. Move further from the centre and you're soon on clay or peat. That soft ground settles over the years, so a sewer pipe that was once neatly laid to a fall develops a belly: a low point where water stands and dirt settles. Cleaning clears the blockage, but only a camera can show whether the pipe itself has started to sag.

Cloudbursts in a flat city

Groningen is flat. In a heavy summer downpour, the sewer has to cope with a lot of rainwater in a short space of time. If your sewer connection is already half blocked with grease or silt, the water takes the easiest way back up: through the shower drain, the floor drain in the utility room or the drain in the garden. If a drain is still slow after a downpour like that, have the pipe checked before the next one arrives.

Neighbourhood by neighbourhood: where things get stuck in Groningen

The age of a home says a lot about the pipes inside it. In Groningen we see four broad types of situation, each with its own weak spot. So when you call us for drain unblocking in Groningen, we'll often ask roughly when your house was built.

Old neighbourhoods outside the Diepenring: Oranjebuurt, Zeeheldenbuurt and Schildersbuurt

When the city grew beyond its old fortifications around 1900, streets full of townhouses, upstairs and downstairs flats and simpler terraces went up to the north and west of the centre. Many of those buildings were later split into flats or let out as rooms. The original drainage was meant for one kitchen and one toilet; now as many as three bathrooms may discharge into it. In a house like this, the blockage is often in the shared collector pipe under the ground floor, where everything from upstairs and downstairs comes together. Old clay and cast-iron pipes are also rougher on the inside than PVC, so grease and paper catch on them more easily.

On the north side: De Hoogte and the Indische Buurt

De Hoogte and the Indische Buurt are pre-war neighbourhoods with lots of small terraced houses. The kitchens are cramped, and the kitchen waste pipe often takes a long, flat route under the floor to the street or the back garden. A stretch with so little fall is where grease settles first. Where a new PVC waste pipe was joined to the old sewer connection during a renovation, there's usually an adaptor. Dirt tends to collect there as well, precisely because the diameter or the fall changes at that point.

In the leafy south: De Wijert and Corpus den Hoorn

De Wijert is a post-war neighbourhood that was deliberately laid out with plenty of greenery: public gardens, rows of trees and gardens where the trees have now grown to a good size. Corpus den Hoorn, also in the south, has a mix of flats and family homes. Many of the original sewer connections still run under the gardens here, with a joint every few metres, and it's exactly those joints that attract roots. In the flats there's also the shared soil stack, which collects the waste water from an entire stairwell.

New builds by the water: Reitdiep and Meerstad

Along the Reitdiep and in Meerstad, the pipes are plastic and laid to a proper fall. Even so, we're called out there regularly. In the first few years after completion, building debris, sealant and bits of insulation work loose and get stuck in a bend. Modern toilets also flush with less water, so a wad of wet wipes doesn't travel as far.

Student houses and nightlife streets: drains working overtime

With the University of Groningen and the Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen is a true student city, and the centre stays lively until the small hours. Both take their toll on the drains.

Eight residents, one kitchen drain

In the Zeeheldenbuurt, the Schildersbuurt and around the Noorderplantsoen park, five, eight or even more residents often share one kitchen and one toilet. Those drains were never designed for that much use. Wet wipes, frying fat and big clumps of hair go down them every day. When the toilet blocks in a house like that, everyone is affected at once.

Grease from the kitchens around the Poelestraat

Restaurants and cafés in the Poelestraat, the Peperstraat and around the Vismarkt send a lot of grease and starch down the drain. Even where there's a grease trap, the pipe behind it can slowly silt up. People living in flats above bars and restaurants sometimes notice it first as a smelly or gurgling sink. Jetting the pipe clean before it gets that far, ideally outside opening hours, stops it giving out on a busy Friday night.

Blocked sewer in Groningen: your pipe or the municipality's?

When the blockage is further down the system, you'll soon be asking whose job it is to fix it. The answer depends on where the blockage is and what kind of home you live in.

From your kitchen sink to the municipal sewer

In a family home, the waste pipe runs through the crawl space and the garden to the main sewer in the street. As a rule, everything within your property is the homeowner's responsibility, while the section under the pavement and the road is usually the municipality's. There's often an inspection chamber close to the front wall or in the front garden, roughly at the dividing line. The exact arrangements vary from one municipality to another, so the engineer first works out where the blockage is. If it turns out to be under the public road, you'll be told straight away so you can report it to the municipality.

Rented room, housing association or VvE

If you rent a room, or a home from a housing association, your landlord is your first point of contact. Who pays for the unblocking is set out in the tenancy agreement or the terms and conditions. If you live in a flat with a VvE (owners' association), the usual rule is that the waste pipes from your own kitchen and bathroom up to the soil stack are your responsibility, while the soil stack itself is part of the building. If water comes up in several homes at once, let the property manager know immediately.

Three situations we often come across in Groningen

Sewage in the crawl space

In a house on clay or peat, a connection under the floor can work loose as the ground beneath it sinks. If the drainage is blocked or has come apart, you'll notice a sewage smell in the house or water in the crawl space even in dry weather. Use as little water as possible and keep the crawl space hatch closed so the smell doesn't spread any further into the house. The engineer clears the pipe and uses a camera to check whether a coupling has come loose.

Your downstairs neighbours get your washing-up water

In a building split into flats in the Oranjebuurt or the Zeeheldenbuurt, a blockage in the shared pipe often shows up first in the downstairs flat. When the neighbours upstairs switch on the dishwasher, the shower downstairs starts to bubble. Agree that nobody in the building runs any more water, and make the call together so the engineer knows straight away that it's the shared pipe.

The kitchen drain after a house dinner

After an evening cooking for twelve housemates, the sink is sometimes full to the brim. Take the strainer out of the plughole and carefully try a plunger. If that doesn't work, don't unscrew the trap over a full sink; wait for the engineer instead. In houses like these, the blockage in a kitchen sink is usually beyond the trap, in the first horizontal run of pipe.

What to expect when you call us in Groningen

If you have a blockage, call 085 333 4698. You'll go straight through to someone who knows about drains, even in the middle of the night. Tell us which drain is blocked, whether water is coming up and whether more than one drain is affected. If the toilet, shower and kitchen sink are all slow, the blockage is usually further along the sewer pipe rather than in a trap.

From what you tell us, we assess the job and give you a price estimate up front. If you're happy to go ahead, an engineer heads over to you. For drain unblocking in Groningen, the engineer always starts by pinpointing the blockage, for example through the rodding eye in the crawl space or the inspection chamber in the garden. The pipe is then cleared with a drain snake, an electric drain machine or a high-pressure jetter. Finally, the engineer explains what caused the problem and how to stop it happening again.

Drain unblocking services we often provide in Groningen

As a drain unblocking company in Groningen, we focus entirely on blockages in drains and sewers.

Inside the home

A blocked toilet in a student house or upstairs flat can usually be sorted quickly; read more about toilet unblocking. If it's grease in the kitchen, kitchen sink unblocking is the answer: we clean both the trap and the pipe up to the soil stack. In bathrooms with a slow shower drain, shower drain unblocking does the job, often along with advice on fitting a hair catcher.

Outside and underground

If the water comes back up in the garden inspection chamber or the crawl space, the problem lies deeper. With sewer cleaning, we jet the pipe clean along its full length, removing grease deposits and roots. If a blockage keeps coming back, a drain camera inspection reveals subsidence, fractures or root intrusion. In Haren and Helpman, with their many old trees, that's often the quickest route to a lasting solution.

Drain unblocking in Groningen: what it costs

Unblocking starts from €129. The call-out charge is extra; it isn't included in that figure. If you call in the evening, at night, at the weekend or on a public holiday, an out-of-hours rate applies. For larger jobs, such as cleaning a completely silted-up sewer pipe or a camera inspection followed by cleaning, you can ask for a quote. In every case, you get a price estimate up front, so you decide for yourself whether the work goes ahead.

Five things you can do right now

A few simple steps limit the disruption and help the engineer work faster:

• Stop flushing and don't run water in any drains connected to the same pipe.
• Have a bucket and towels ready if water is coming up out of the shower or floor drain.
• Check whether the inspection chamber in the garden is full; that tells the engineer roughly where the blockage is.
• Don't pour chemical drain cleaner or boiling water into a PVC pipe; it can damage the pipe and is dangerous for whoever works on the drain afterwards.
• In a student house, put a note on the toilet door so housemates don't flush without realising.

Once the drain is clear again, it's all about prevention. Let frying fat cool and put it in the bin with your general waste. If you have a garden with large trees, have the sewer pipe checked every few years so roots don't get the chance to grow into a proper blockage.

From Hoogkerk to Ten Boer, and beyond

As well as the city itself, we work in all the villages and neighbourhoods of the municipality, including Haren, Hoogkerk, Meerstad and Ten Boer. Further south, you can call on us for a blockage in Zwolle, Apeldoorn and Enschede. Our service area covers the whole of the Netherlands; the page listing our locations shows the cities that have their own page.

Dealing with a blocked drain in Groningen right now? Call 085 333 4698. We'll come out for drain unblocking in Groningen as quickly as possible, even if it's long past midnight.