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Catch Basin Repair in New Richmond

Catch Basin Repair in New Richmond, Wisconsin.

Catch basin repair and rebuild for commercial lots in New Richmond. Cut back, rebuilt, the frame reset to grade and the asphalt tied back in.

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4.7 from 21 Google reviews

About an hour and fifteen minutes northwest of Eau Claire on I-94 and Highway 64. The estimate is free.

A freshly poured square concrete collar finished flush around a storm drain grate in a striped commercial parking lot.
4.7 Google ratingFrom 21 reviews
1-3 days Typical basinDepending on depth
7 days Sinkhole, start to doneA customer's words, not ours

Working in New Richmond

The lots with storm structures in them here are the flat ones: the hospital campus on Hospital Road, the retail on West Richmond Way, and the business park, which was built out with water, sewer, electric, gas and telecom already in the ground. What shows first is the asphalt failing in a ring around the grate, and by then the frame has been dropping for years and the collar under it has gone. A rebuild takes the structure back to sound, sets a new collar and keys the asphalt in at the right pitch. Patching the ring on its own puts the same repair back on next year's list.

From our jobs

Job Photos

Inside a failed catch basin, the collar rusted and the mortar washed out
A failed basin, opened up before the rebuild
Looking down into a catch basin where the mortar has washed out and water stands in the bottom
Mortar washed out, water standing in the structure
A close view of a catch basin edge where the concrete has broken away and undermined the surface around the grate
The edge broken out and the surface undermined
Inside a catch basin, the pipe penetration re-mortared and sealed where it enters the structure
The pipe joint re-mortared inside the structure
A freshly poured square concrete collar around a round storm grate in a striped parking lot
The collar poured back and the grate set to grade
A poured concrete pad around a drain grate at the foot of two loading dock doors, caution tape across the approach
A drain pad poured at a loading dock

All job photos

How a catch basin fails

A catch basin is a buried box with a cast frame and grate sitting on top of it. Water is supposed to go through the grate and out the pipe. What happens over twenty Wisconsin winters is that water gets into the joint between the frame and the structure, freezes, and lifts. Once that joint opens, every rainfall washes a little of the bedding out from under the surrounding asphalt, and the ring of failure spreads outward from the grate a few inches a year. That's why the symptom you notice is never the drain itself. It's the asphalt around it, and by then the structure underneath has usually been moving for years.

A mismatched concrete patch poured around a storm grate in a cracked school parking lot, marked with a red no symbol

Patching around it

What gets done when the budget is tight

  • Cold patch thrown in the dip, gone by spring
  • Sealer over the low spot, which changes the color and nothing else
  • An overlay that follows the same failing grade back down
  • The hole reappears, slightly wider, every year
A full concrete pad poured around a storm grate set flush to grade in a driveway, coned off, marked with a green check

Rebuilding it

What actually stops it

  • Saw-cut back to sound asphalt, structure exposed
  • Failed structure replaced, frame reset to the right grade
  • New concrete collar poured around the frame
  • Asphalt tied back in at the right pitch so water reaches the grate

The grade is the part people skip. A basin reset an inch high is a basin that never drains again, and the lot ponds somewhere new.

Reset, rebuild, or replace?

What the symptom usually means

What you can see without lifting the grate, and what it usually turns out to be.

  • A shallow dip around the grate, asphalt still soundUsually a reset. The least expensive fix on this list, and the one that gets left too long.
  • Asphalt broken in a ring around it, water ponds after rainThe common case. Partial rebuild, collar, tie in. One to two days.
  • You can see the structure crumbling through the grateDepends how far down it goes. This is the one that needs looking at, not quoting blind.
  • The grate rocks or has dropped below the surface by an inch or moreOften a full rebuild of the upper structure. Sometimes the frame alone. We'll say which.
  • Water backs up out of it, or drains away far slower than it used toThat's usually the pipe connection, not the box. It needs opening up, and no surface repair touches it.
  • A void you can see into, or the ground has dropped beside itMaterial is being washed away underneath. Call it in sooner rather than later; this is the one that turns into a sinkhole and a claim.

Send a photo with the grate visible and we can usually narrow it to two of the three.

What Decides the Price in New Richmond

It depends almost entirely on what is found once the grate is off, which is why the assessment is free. All three of these cost less than the repaving that follows if the basin is left alone.

Reset

Frame and grate only

Measured on site

  • Structure is sound, the frame has settled or lifted
  • Saw cut, reset to grade, new collar, asphalt tie-in

Partial rebuild

Top courses replaced

Measured on site

  • The common one. The top of the structure has deteriorated
  • Rebuild the top of the structure, reset, collar, tie-in

Full replacement

Structure down to the pipe

Measured on site

  • Structure has failed or the pipe connection has gone
  • Deeper excavation, longer, and the only real fix at that point

What moves it: depth, whether the pipe connection is sound, how much asphalt has to come out around it, and whether the lot has to stay open while we work. Multiple basins on one visit come down per basin, because the trip is already paid for.

How the Work Goes in New Richmond

Excavation, structure repair, concrete and the asphalt tie-in, in the order they happen.

Look at it with the grate off

Most of what's wrong is invisible from above. We lift the grate, look at the structure and the pipe, and tell you which of the three bands you're in.

Saw cut back to sound asphalt

Clean vertical edges, cut wide enough to reach material that hasn't been undermined. Cutting too tight is why repairs fail at their own seam.

Rebuild and set to grade

Failed courses replaced, frame set so the grate sits slightly below the finished surface. Water has to run to it, which means it can't sit level and definitely can't sit proud.

Concrete collar

Poured around the frame to spread the load off the structure and onto the subgrade. This is the part that stops it happening again in five years.

Asphalt back in, compacted, sealed at the joint

Paved tight to the cut, compacted in lifts, and the perimeter joint sealed. Then the grade gets checked with water, not by eye.

Booking the last of the sealcoating season now · Call (715) 450-9897

Questions We Get in New Richmond

What New Richmond calls us about, answered straight.

More questions answered
How far is New Richmond from you?
About 69 miles, an hour and fifteen minutes, out I-94 and then north on Highway 64. For commercial lots we come. Send the address and what the lot needs and we'll set up a time to walk it. The estimate is free.
Does pavement work go out as a formal bid for a school district?
Yes. You get a written scope with the quantities and a fixed number, in the form the district needs to put in front of a board. Quantities are what let a board compare one number against another, so the scope lists them area by area rather than as a lump.
How much does catch basin repair cost?
It depends on which of the three jobs it turns out to be, and that cannot be known until the grate comes off: a reset, a partial rebuild, or a full replacement. A reset is the cheapest by a wide margin and a replacement is the most expensive. All three cost less than the repaving that follows if the basin is left alone. The assessment is free and the number is fixed before work starts.
How long does a catch basin repair take, and does the lot have to close?
A basin repair is a small excavation in one corner of the lot, not a resurfacing project. How long the repair takes depends on what we find under the casting, and we tell you before we start.
Can you just patch the asphalt around the catch basin instead?
We can, and sometimes that's the right call if the structure is sound and the budget isn't there this year. But if the structure below has gone, patching buys one season. Which of the two you have is visible once the grate is off.
Do you subcontract the excavation or the concrete?
The excavation, the structure repair, the collar and the asphalt tie-in are sequenced and priced together, so you are not holding three quotes and hoping the dates line up.
The area around our drain is breaking up. Is that the basin?
Almost always, yes. Catch basins fail outward from the frame joint, so the asphalt around them starts to go before anything looks wrong with the drain. If the broken area is roughly a ring centered on the grate, that's the signature.
Do you do manhole and utility structure work too?
Yes. A manhole in a parking lot fails the same way and gets the same treatment: cut back, reset to grade, collar, tie in.

The Lots and Surfaces in New Richmond

New Richmond is a city of about 10,900 in St. Croix County, north of the interstate where Highway 64 running east and west meets Highway 65 running north and south through town as Knowles Avenue. It's 69 driving miles from Eau Claire, about an hour and fifteen, out I-94 and then north. Highway 64 is an expressway with at-grade intersections until 145th Street in the city and a two-lane surface road from there in, which is worth knowing if you're routing a truck. The Willow River runs through the city.

The industrial ground is one park, one big plant and an airport. The New Richmond Business and Technical Park runs about 107 acres off Highway 65 on the south side, inside a tax increment district, with water, sewer, electric, natural gas and telecom in, rail under two miles off and the airport three. Syntegon builds packaging machinery at 155 West 3rd Street, a plant that has been through two owners before this one and employs more than 270 people. New Richmond Regional Airport has 123 privately owned hangars, more than any other airport in Wisconsin, better than 275 based aircraft, a jet center and roughly 35,000 to 40,000 operations a year.

The retail and institutional lots are on the two highways. West Richmond Way carries a Walmart Supercenter with a walk-in clinic inside the building, and South Knowles Avenue carries Northwood Technical College's New Richmond campus. Westfields Hospital and Clinic is a full medical campus on Hospital Road with an emergency department, primary and specialty clinics, a pharmacy, inpatient care and maternity. The school district has three elementary schools, a middle school and a high school on East Richmond Way with about 1,100 students, and a 2024 referendum paid for additions, renovations and site work across three of those buildings.

Where we work in New Richmond

  • New Richmond Business and Technical Park
  • West Richmond Way
  • South Knowles Avenue
  • New Richmond Regional Airport

Around New Richmond: New Richmond Regional Airport, The Willow River through town, Mary Park on Mary Park Lake, Freedom Park, The New Richmond West Side Historic District.

10,879 people, 2024 Census estimate.

Wisconsin is split into five frost zones for WisDOT's frozen road declaration, which goes out once the ground has frozen at least 18 inches deep. That's the number that matters to a lot: how far down the frost gets, not how cold the air is.

Get a Free Estimate in New Richmond

Tell us what it looks like and we'll come measure it. You get a written price before anything starts.

(715) 450-9897
  • Free on commercial lots and properties in New Richmond
  • A photo of the problem helps, and it can go in the message
  • Surfaces that are not ready yet get told so at the estimate

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Everything about catch basin repair, including how the work goes and what changes the price