Bartlett Window Well Covers & Basement Windows
Bartlett sits in three counties — Cook north of Devon Avenue, DuPage to the south, and Kane out at Bartlett Pointe West. One village, one building department, three sets of county flood maps.
The housing is tightly concentrated in time: about 89% of it went up between 1970 and 2009, with a median year of 1992. That is the poured-foundation, drain-tile-and-sump era, and the first generation of those systems is now thirty-plus years old.
Brewster Creek, and 9.78 inches
On September 13 and 14, 2008, Bartlett recorded 9.78 inches of rain, and the National Weather Service noted a retention pond overflowing on Bartlett Road. The village's mapped floodplains follow the Brewster Creek tributary on the northwest side, the Wayne Grove Forest Preserve area near downtown, and the Brewster Creek floodplain to the northeast, which drains to the West Branch of the DuPage River.
DuPage County's Brewster Creek Headwaters Project, completed in the autumn of 2013 at roughly $4.8 million, built flood storage in Pratt's Wayne Woods along with more than 2,100 feet of 60-inch pipe under Stearns Road and nearly 5,000 feet of bypass storm sewer.
Bartlett participates in the National Flood Insurance Program and in FEMA's Community Rating System, so residents' flood insurance premiums are discounted. Planning & Development Services administers floodplain questions at 630-540-5920.
The rule that catches people here is a plumbing rule
We read Bartlett's building code amendments. There are no local changes to the emergency escape opening or foundation drainage sections, so the 2018 International Residential Code governs your window and well sizing as written — 5.7 square feet of opening, 9 square feet of well, 36 inches of projection, a ladder past 44 inches deep, and a cover that releases from inside.
Bartlett's own rules live in the plumbing code instead, and they bear directly on basement water. Sump pumps used to drain basements and floor drains may not be connected to the sanitary sewer. In homes with overhead sewers, a separate sump pump is required for laundry facilities and inside floor drains, discharging to the sanitary sewer. And gravity sewers draining any basement, below-grade area or crawl space may not connect to a public storm sewer unless the Village Engineer certifies that gravity drainage is feasible.
If a contractor proposes tying your window well drain into whatever is convenient, that ordinance is the reason to ask exactly where it ends up. Permits run through the Building Division at Planning & Development Services; window and door replacement and remodels are both listed permit types.
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Bartlett Window Well Covers | Bartlett Window Wells | Bartlett Egress Window Wells | Bartlett Well Covers | Bartlett Basement Window Well Covers