Drainage and plumbing, North Vancouver
Drainage and Plumbing in North Vancouver
North Vancouver is two municipalities, the City and the District, with different bylaws and different storm systems. What they share is the ground. Both sit on the lower flank of the North Shore Mountains, where steep, narrow watersheds send water down fast.
On the North Shore stormwater is not a tidiness issue. The District’s own engineers called managing it one of the most promising ways to reduce landslide risk. We camera the line before anybody quotes a number.
Some blocks are still drained by a four inch clay tile from the 1910s
This one comes straight out of the City of North Vancouver’s Integrated Stormwater Management Plan. The storm system started in the 1910s as back of sidewalk drains, typically four inch clay tile, laid to collect local drainage and keep the sidewalks dry. That grew into the 148 km system described in the 2016 plan, and the City now reports more than 150 km of storm sewer.
But not everywhere grew. In the City’s own words, in some places the four inch back of walk system or laneway ditches are still the primary drainage infrastructure, and areas relying on back of walk drains are considered unserviced and are a priority for new storm sewer construction. A 100 mm clay line is exactly what roots and sediment kill first.
The rest of the system is not much younger. Only 10% of the present day storm system was built by 1960, about 50% by 1970, and more than 85% by 1985. The plan says most of it went in during a short period in the 1960s, designed to the practice of the day, and likely did not foresee the level of impervious surfaces being introduced now. 32.1 km of it, about 21.7%, is already undersized against the current ten year design criteria.
So if your perimeter drain discharges into a 1965 street pipe on a block that has since doubled its roof and driveway area, the pipe is at its limit before your yard even enters the conversation.
The District next door works differently and it is worth knowing which one you are in. The District was incorporated in 1891 and runs from the Capilano River east to Indian Arm. Its Sewer Bylaw 6656 establishes storm and sanitary as fully separate systems, requires all stormwater and hard surface runoff to go to the storm sewer, and does not let you discharge groundwater into that storm sewer without permission. It also reserves work on the sewer connection itself to District staff or District contractors unless the Director says otherwise. The City was incorporated in 1907 and runs from Mackay Creek east to Lynn Creek, with Lonsdale climbing from the Quay up to 29th Street.
Lower Lonsdale is built on top of buried creeks
Also from the City’s plan, and it is worth reading slowly. South of about Keith Road west of Lonsdale, and south of 19th Street around Grand Boulevard, there were once small streams that may have occurred as regularly as every other block.
The plan names them. A larger stream from Greenwood Park crossed Lonsdale at 13th on its way south to Burrard Inlet near Chesterfield. Another flowed south east of St Andrews through what are now the Lower Lonsdale parks, meeting the inlet west of St Patricks. A third ran from Grand Boulevard down to Moodyville and reached the water near the foot of Moody Avenue. The easternmost came from Calverhall and Cloverley, and part of that channel can still be seen in Sunrise Park before it disappears under the Port lands. All of them were largely moved into the storm sewer network by the 1960s.
The City says how it knows: old subdivision maps, decommissioned culverts and early storm sewers. What it means for you is simple enough. Water still wants to go where it always went, and on those blocks the pipe is now the creek.
The other reason the old pipes are struggling is that there is more water reaching them. In the City, 55% of the land is impervious surface, street rights of way are 83% impervious, and a typical low density lot runs anywhere from 35% to 65% depending on whether it is an older home or a new build. The City’s plan is blunt that the second generation of development is increasing impervious area incrementally as smaller houses make way for larger ones. Wagg Creek’s watershed, which the City calls its most urbanised stream, is 50% impervious and takes a large share of the runoff off the roads near Lonsdale, Highway 1 included.
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North Vancouver drainage and plumbing FAQ
Not necessarily. The City of North Vancouver states that in some places the original four inch back of walk clay tile system or laneway ditches are still the primary drainage infrastructure, and it calls those areas unserviced. Those blocks are a priority for new storm sewer construction, which tells you how the City sees them.
Because the pipe stayed the same and the neighbourhood did not. Most of the City’s storm system went in during a short period in the 1960s, and the City’s own plan says the design likely did not foresee the level of impervious surface being added since. 21.7% of the system is already undersized against the current ten year criteria.
Metro Vancouver says yes, and it says it in print. Both the City and the District were named as high inflow and infiltration areas on 2019 flow data, and the regional advice to homeowners is to have pipes inspected with a camera at least once a decade, then fix or replace old or damaged pipe.
No, and it is one of the named causes of the problem. Metro Vancouver lists roof and foundation drains improperly connected to a sanitary sewer line as a source of inflow and tells owners to get them rerouted to the storm sewer. In the District, Bylaw 6656 requires stormwater and hard surface runoff to discharge to the storm sewer system.
In the District, not by default. Bylaw 6656 says no person shall discharge groundwater to the storm sewer system, with limited exceptions the Director can permit for single family, and an outright ban for houseplex redevelopment. That is worth checking before a pump gets installed, not after.
The District’s bylaw reserves work on the connection itself to District staff or District contractors, unless the Director allows a private contractor case by case under a servicing agreement. Everything on your side of that is normal contractor work, and it is what we do.
On the Berkley escarpment it was treated as exactly that. After the January 2005 landslide the District connected roughly 43 properties to the storm sewer, and its engineers wrote that stormwater management is one of the most promising ways to reduce landslide risk, expecting storm connections and roadway drainage work to cut the annual probability of flow slides by about 65%. The 1979 Swinburne Avenue debris flows were attributed to roof drainage running onto the slope instead of into the storm drain.
In November 2014 more than 86 millimetres fell on North Vancouver in a night, creeks jumped their banks and more than a dozen homes flooded. In October 2024 an atmospheric river dropped an estimated 340 mm over three days, with Deep Cove hardest hit. The District’s mayor said that under the old way of calculating storm frequency it was a one in 100 year event, but going forward it is more like something to expect every 20 or 25 years.
Glacial, and variable. The District’s engineering report on the Berkley escarpment logs a profile running from loose sandy fill and silty fill through colluvium and weathered glaciomarine silt down to very dense lodgement till. That is nothing like the delta silt under Richmond or south Vancouver, and it changes how a trench behaves.
Both municipalities. Lower Lonsdale and the Lonsdale corridor up to 29th, Grand Boulevard, Moodyville, Lynn Valley, Edgemont, Pemberton Heights and the District east toward the Seymour, plus West Vancouver across the Capilano.
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