The Infrastructure Under Your Driveway

You spend so much time worrying about the systems inside your home that it's easy to forget the ones buried right outside your property line. You can install the best appliances and maintain a perfect roof. But as city infrastructure ages across the country, homeowners are finding out the hard way: a pristine house doesn't mean much if the street out front suddenly gives way.

The ticking clocks under the street

Every city is fighting a quiet, expensive war beneath its pavement. In places like Portland, almost a quarter of the water pipes were installed before 1930. Those massive cast iron pipes from the early 1900s actually tend to outlast the thinner ones manufactured in the 1950s and 1960s, City of Portland data shows. To figure out which aging segment will burst next, the local water bureau uses a machine learning model to narrow down hundreds of potential replacements to a manageable list. Waiting for a disaster costs too much. Now, cities are hunting for weak spots in the grid before your morning shower gets interrupted.

When geology meets rapid growth

Pipes aren't the only problem. The earth itself shifts under the weight of rapid suburban expansion. In King of Prussia, local officials are two years into fixing a massive highway sinkhole caused by an ancient karst formation of limestone and dolomite, Inquirer.com reports. The surrounding township's population has jumped 25% since 2010. All that new development changes how water flows underground, which can wash away the dirt supporting the roads. A giant sinkhole recently swallowed part of a Spectrum service van in another part of the country, according to NBC News. When the street collapses, the local economy freezes. One nearby convenience store manager estimates daily revenues plummeted to a fraction of their normal levels due to the road closure.

Your property's livability is heavily tied to the health of the public dirt and asphalt at the end of your driveway.

What's happening in your state

Oregon: Portland crews are replacing around 30,000 feet of water main each year to stay ahead of catastrophic breaks in highly vulnerable neighborhoods.

Georgia: Atlanta residents in areas like South Fulton and Fairburn just had a boil water advisory lifted. A broken water main near the Chattahoochee Water Treatment Plant compromised local taps, CBS News reports.

Pennsylvania: Crews are drilling as deep as 100 feet to inject pressurized grout into the subsurface of Route 202. They hope to stabilize the ground after years of sinkhole issues.