The storms that rolled through Homewood and Flossmoor late Friday, April 3, and early Saturday, April 4, caused a number of street closures, basement flooding and inundated yards and parks — and frustration for a number of residents.

Several people posted photos of swamped streets in their neighborhoods. One person noted that the storm drains were not blocked, but the lake on their street was not receding. 

Homewood Public Works Director Josh Burman had an explanation for the drainage backup. It wasn’t the amount of rain itself. It was the duration of the precipitation: too much water in too short a time span. 

Drainage systems “are rated to take so many gallons per minute. When they meet that threshold … the system is at capacity and it just needs to take time to recover.” He said the area received more than two inches of rain in about an hour. 

“It’s a lot of water all at once,” he said.

Burman noted that flooding in as many as 10 locations around Homewood caused street closures overnight and early Saturday morning. 

Some of those problems were expected. 

The Dixie Highway viaduct, for example, frequently floods, due in part to a collapsed drainage pipe just north of the structure. It was closed for more than 12 hours on April 4. 

IDOT is expected to start a project in coming weeks that will repair and improve viaduct drainage. 

Some of the flooded locations were surprises. 

Water covered Governors Highway just south of the Cherry Creek commercial center into the afternoon Saturday. That was a place Burman hadn’t seen flood before. A new drainage structure and wetland was built just south of that location in 2017-2018 and has relieved flooding in the area for the most part. 

It couldn’t keep up with the volume of water early April 4.

Burman said he had two-member teams working throughout the village from 2 a.m. on to block flooded streets and clear blocked storm drains. 

Clearing drains of debris actually began before the storm hit. Burman said public works staff monitors weather forecasts and prepares by clearing drain grates ahead of time, a process the village asks residents to help with since public works staff can’t get to every grate in time.

The experience was similar for Flossmoor Public Works crews. Director John Brunke said staff members worked through the night to address flooding problems.

The Flossmoor Road viaduct was also closed for several hours, as were a number of streets throughout the village.

Burman said Homewood is upgrading its storm sewer system as fast as it can, but it’s a generation-long project. 

One long-awaited drainage improvement project is close to getting started. Burman spoke at the Homewood Village Board meeting on April 14 about improvements planned for the 1400 block of Ridge Road and on Loomis Avenue. 

Water has long pooled in back yards in that area. Burman said that when homes were built in the past, back yards were designed to be detention basins, collecting water to keep it from seeping into homes. The project slated for the 2026-2027 fiscal year, which starts May 1, will add drainage capacity to help the water recede more quickly. The project is partially funded by IDOT.

As former Homewood Public Works Director John Schaefer used to note, the big challenge with improving drainage systems in a built-out area like the South Suburbs is where to take the excess water. Options are few. 

In the case of the Ridge Road project, water will be sent to the Prairie Lakes retention basins east of Ashland Avenue. 

Flossmoor has wrestled with the same problem. It’s multi-phase flood reduction project, which will continue this year if a funding hold-up can be resolved, will take water from the Flossmoor Road viaduct and areas of the Heather Hill neighborhood and temporarily store it in a detention basin built in 2024 adjacent to Heather Hill School.

Brunke said the new basin partially filled during the storm, but it won’t be fully tested until the line from the viaduct to the basin is completed. 

The problem is made worse by climate trends. In a study by the Illinois State Water Survey published in January 2025, researchers said increasingly intense storms make solutions difficult to implement.

“In changing climate, relying on current precipitation frequencies for designing long-term infrastructure is becoming progressively unsustainable. What is considered safe and adequate today may not hold true in the future,” according to the report.

As Burman noted, local infrastructure built mostly in the previous century might not have been designed to handle the increasingly intense rain events of today. Planning the next generation drainage systems will be a new challenge.

In the meantime, both villages have programs in place to help residents solve drainage problems on their property. For information about Flossmoor’s program click here or call public works at 708-957-4100. For information about Homewood’s program click here or call public works at 708-206-3470.

Related stories

• MWRD’s massive stones, flood project mean dry homes near H-F (Sept. 11, 2017).
• Excess water: The drainage dilemma (Sept. 12, 2019).
• Flossmoor Road Viaduct Improvements Project proposes second phase of flood mitigation plan (May 21, 2023).