Drain Unblocking Nijmegen

Drain unblocking in Nijmegen: a city on an ice-age ridge

Cycle through Nijmegen and you'll notice it straight away: this city isn't flat. The centre sits on a ridge of ground pushed up by ice-age glaciers, with the Waal at its foot. That combination affects how drains and sewers behave. So a blockage in Nijmegen-Oost often has a different cause from one in Dukenburg or Lent.

Rainwater running downhill

Because of the slopes, rainwater rushes downhill in a downpour. The Benedenstad (the lower town) and the neighbourhoods along the Waal then have to cope with a lot of water in a short time. If the sewer connection there is already partly silted up with grease or sand, the water can come back into the house through the shower drain or a basement drain.

Steep pipes with flat sections

Things can go wrong on the slopes themselves, too. A steep pipe carries water away quickly, but solids get left behind exactly where the fall levels out, for example under the front garden or just before the connection to the main sewer. That's where a plug of paper, grease and sand slowly builds up. So when we're called out for drain unblocking in Nijmegen at a house on a slope, the engineer often looks for the blockage at that transition point rather than indoors.

From Oost to the Waalsprong: drain unblocking in Nijmegen by district

In Nijmegen, each era of building comes with its own kind of blockage, from the oldest streets around the centre to the new builds on the north bank.

Old buildings, new bathrooms

In Altrade, Hengstdal and the old streets around the Benedenstad, some homes are more than a hundred years old. Many buildings have been split into flats or student rooms. New bathrooms and kitchens have been connected to waste pipes that were never designed for them. A shared soil stack serving five or six kitchens fouls up faster, especially if people cook a lot with oil and butter.

Low by the river: Waterkwartier and Willemskwartier

Nijmegen-West is home to working-class districts such as the Waterkwartier, low-lying by the Waal, and the Willemskwartier, which dates from the interwar years. Many homes have been renovated or replaced over the years, but there's sometimes still an older connection under the floor and in the back garden. Where new meets old, there's an adaptor fitting that catches dirt. Because these neighbourhoods lie lower than the ridge, residents here may notice an overloaded sewer after a cloudburst sooner than people higher up in the city.

Green neighbourhoods and root intrusion

Brakkenstein, the Kwakkenberg and the area around the Goffertpark have plenty of old trees. Their roots go looking for moisture and easily push through the joints of old clay pipes. It starts innocently enough: a drain that's a little slow. Over time, though, a dense mat of roots grows inside the pipe, and an ordinary drain snake can no longer shift it.

Home zones and walk-up flats from Hatert to Lindenholt

Hatert was largely built after the war, with terraced houses and walk-up flats where several households share one soil stack. The home zones of Dukenburg and Lindenholt (woonerven, traffic-calmed residential streets) were laid out between the late 1960s and the 1980s. Kitchens and bathrooms there have often been updated at some point, but the pipes in the crawl space and under the garden are mostly still original. There are also lots of trees and shrubs close to the homes, so garden inspection chambers and downpipes fill up with leaves in autumn. When we get a call from these districts, we check those chambers straight away as well.

Young homes on the north bank

North of the Waal, Lent, Oosterhout and Ressen have grown considerably. The homes are new and the pipework modern. Even so, we get regular calls from there, for example about a toilet full of wipes, a shower drain full of hair or building debris that comes loose in the pipe after a few years.

Student rooms in Oost and crowds on the Waalkade

Radboud University and HAN University of Applied Sciences give Nijmegen a large student population, and there's plenty going on in the city centre in summer. It all shows in the drains.

Shared kitchens in Oost

In the converted houses of Nijmegen-Oost, six or more students often share one kitchen. Pans of frying fat, rice and pasta water go down the same sink every day. Agree as a household that fat goes into a jar and the strainer stays in the plughole. If the kitchen drain does get blocked, we usually clear the whole pipe down to the soil stack, so it doesn't happen again a week later. If the toilet in a shared house like this is blocked, use another one in the meantime if there is one, and don't flush again.

Restaurants and bars during the Vierdaagsefeesten

There are lots of cafés and restaurants in the Benedenstad and along the Waalkade. During the Vierdaagsefeesten, the festival week in July, the city is packed and kitchens and toilets are in use until the small hours. A grease trap that was already nearly full, or a pipe coated with grease, can suddenly give up the ghost. Have a pipe like that cleaned before the summer, and if something goes wrong during the festivities, feel free to call us in the middle of the night.

Sewer unblocking in Nijmegen: your part and the municipality's

If the blockage is further along than the last drain in the house, that raises the question of who is responsible for that stretch of pipe.

Your plot and the street

In the Netherlands, the drain pipe on your own land is generally the owner's responsibility, and the part under the pavement and the street is the municipality's. Exactly where one ends and the other begins varies from municipality to municipality. Often an inspection chamber by the front of the house or in the front garden marks the end of your part. The engineer uses the camera to pinpoint where the blockage or break is, so you know whether you need to call the municipality. If the blockage is under the public road, the engineer notes where they found it, so you can pass that on when you report it.

Rooms, rented homes and VvEs

If you rent a room or a home, always let your landlord know there's a blockage; your tenancy agreement says who gets the bill. In an apartment building with a VvE (owners' association), the soil stack is usually shared. If water that isn't from your home is coming up, let the property manager know as well.

Services on both sides of the Waal

As a drain unblocking company in Nijmegen, we work in every district, on both sides of the Waal. An overflowing toilet is a job for our toilet unblocking service. A bathroom basin full of hair and toothpaste calls for washbasin unblocking, and a kitchen with grease problems for kitchen sink unblocking.

For recurring problems with the garden inspection chamber or in the basement, we use sewer cleaning with a high-pressure jetter. If the gutter and downpipe overflow in a downpour, downpipe unblocking is the answer. If we suspect roots or a break, we first look inside the pipe with a camera, so there's no digging based on guesswork.

What to do, symptom by symptom

Water coming up out of a drain

If water comes up out of the shower drain, a floor drain or the inspection chamber in the garden, the blockage is usually beyond the last connection in the house: you have a blocked sewer somewhere between your home and the street. In that case, don't use any drains at all: don't flush the toilet, and switch off the washing machine and dishwasher too. Put towels around the drain and move your belongings up off the floor. Only lift the cover of the garden inspection chamber if it's safe to do so, and keep children and pets away.

One drain running slowly

If only the kitchen sink, the washbasin or the shower drain is slow, the problem is often in the trap or the first section of pipe. With a shower drain, you can lift out the grate and remove any hair you can see, but don't push anything further down the pipe. Don't pour boiling water or chemical drain cleaner down the drain either: that rarely shifts a grease plug and can damage PVC and rubber seals.

After unblocking

A few simple habits help prevent a repeat. Wipe pans out with kitchen paper before washing them, and let deep-frying fat set before you throw it away. Use a hair catcher and keep a small bin for wipes and cotton buds. In autumn, clear the leaves out of the gutter and check the leaf guard on the downpipe, especially if there are trees nearby.

What to tell us on the phone

Call 085 333 4698 at any hour to report a blocked drain in Nijmegen. The more you can tell us, the better the engineer can prepare. Useful things to mention:

• which drain is causing the problem and whether other drains are slow too;
• whether water is coming up, and if so, where;
• what you've already tried yourself;
• whether you live in a block of flats, an upstairs flat or a house.

With that information, we can judge whether it'll be a quick job or whether heavier equipment is needed, such as a high-pressure jetter or a camera. You'll get a price estimate straight away. If you're happy to go ahead, the engineer sets off and gets to you as quickly as possible: often the same day, and usually within the hour in an emergency. Once there, they first locate the blockage. Then comes the unblocking itself, followed by a check that the water is draining properly again. Finally, they'll explain what caused it, so you know what to look out for in future.

Drain unblocking in Nijmegen: rates and price estimates

A standard unblocking job starts from €129. The call-out charge is extra and isn't included in that starting price. In the evening, at night, at weekends or on a public holiday, we charge an out-of-hours rate. For a bigger project, such as cleaning an entire sewer pipe under a building in the Benedenstad, or a camera inspection followed by advice, you can ask for a quote. You'll always know the approximate cost before the work begins.

Arnhem, Den Bosch and beyond

As well as Nijmegen itself, we cover the wider region and the rest of the Netherlands. Just to the north lies Arnhem, where you can call on us in exactly the same way. To the west and south we work in Den Bosch and Eindhoven, and towards the Veluwe in Apeldoorn. Our where we work page lists a selection of places that have their own page.

Got a drain that won't empty right now? Call 085 333 4698. For drain unblocking in Nijmegen, you can reach us 24 hours a day.