Drain Cleaning in Antonito, CO

Antonito homes and their sewer lines

Antonito homes are a mix of adobe and stucco houses, brick and frame homes from the railroad years along Main Street and the side streets, and manufactured homes, with farmhouses on the irrigated ground along the Conejos River.

The Town of Antonito provides water and sewer in town. The town has worked through a series of infrastructure grants, Main Street first, then drinking water, then a new wastewater treatment facility that USDA Rural Development and the state Department of Local Affairs helped fund, roughly $2.8 million of a $4.6 million project. Homes outside town use wells and septic.

Many Antonito houses drain through clay or cast iron laid decades ago, sometimes with plumbing added to an older adobe after the fact.

Antonito drain problems

Antonito drain calls come from cold and age. At nearly 7,900 feet on the valley floor, subzero mornings freeze drains in crawlspaces and outside walls, while cottonwoods and willows near the Conejos and the town's irrigation ditches send roots into old clay joints.

What drain work usually costs in Antonito

From sheep camp to narrow-gauge terminus

Antonito started as a sheep herding camp called San Antonio Junction, named for the nearby rivers. When the Denver and Rio Grande pushed south from Alamosa, the camp took the name Antonito, and the San Antonio post office moved to Antonito in January 1881. The town incorporated in December 1889. The narrow-gauge line west over Cumbres Pass survives as the Cumbres and Toltec Scenic Railroad, with its yard and shops in Antonito and its other end in Chama, New Mexico.

Nearby Conejos has Our Lady of Guadalupe church, counted as the oldest congregation in Colorado, and Antonito itself is known for Cano's Castle, a folk art house built from scrap metal, and for scenes in the opening of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

A town rebuilding its systems in order

Antonito's leaders have described their infrastructure work as a sequence: Main Street first, then drinking water, then wastewater. The new wastewater treatment facility was funded in part by USDA Rural Development and the Colorado Department of Local Affairs, about $2.8 million of a roughly $4.6 million project, and was described as giving the town room to grow. US 285 through town was rebuilt in a 2015 state project.

None of that changes who owns the pipe under your yard. In Antonito, as elsewhere, the town maintains its mains and plant, and the lateral from your house to the main belongs to you. If your street is being dug up for town work, ask whether it's a good time to have your own line checked.

Nearly 7,900 feet and very cold

Antonito sits at about 7,890 feet on the floor of the San Luis Valley, one of the coldest inhabited places in the lower 48 on clear winter nights. Cold air drains off the San Juans and the Sangre de Cristos and settles on the valley floor. Drains in crawlspaces, under older floors and along north walls freeze when the temperature drops well below zero. Keep crawlspace vents closed, keep heat in rooms with plumbing, and if a drain stops on a frigid morning, warm the space and call rather than forcing it with a plunger or chemicals.

Adobe houses with plumbing added later

Many of Antonito's oldest homes were built of adobe before indoor plumbing was common, and bathrooms and kitchens were added later. A drain added through a thick adobe wall or a dirt crawlspace may have too little slope, sharp turns or odd connections to the original line. These are the houses where a small clog keeps coming back. A camera inspection maps where the line goes and shows whether the trouble is a household clog or a flaw in how the line was laid.

The Conejos, ditches and roots

Irrigated fields along the Conejos River and the ditches that serve them keep the ground around Antonito moist through the summer, and cottonwoods and willows grow wherever there's water. Their roots find the joints in old clay laterals. A line that slows in late summer and backs up into the lowest drain is a common Antonito root call. Root cutting clears it; if roots come back every year, a liner or a section of new pipe may cost less over time.

If an Antonito drain backs up

1. 01

   Stop running water

   In an Antonito house with a clogged main, everything ends up in the lowest drain.

2. 02

   Warm the space

   On a subzero morning, a frozen line is likely; heat the crawlspace or room.

3. 03

   Find the cleanout

   Older Antonito yards may have a buried cleanout between the house and the street.

4. 04

   Describe the house

   Tell the plumber if it's adobe and whether plumbing was added later.

Antonito warning signs

• A drain that stops on the coldest Antonito mornings
• A clog that keeps coming back in the same fixture
• Roots on the cable after clearing
• Gurgling toilets
• Wet ground over a septic field outside town

What changes the price in Antonito

Nearly every Antonito call starts with a 28-mile drive down US 285 from Alamosa, so a trip charge is normal and worth asking about when you phone. A kitchen clog cleared in one visit stays near the bottom of the table above. A lateral frozen under an adobe floor, a root mass near the Conejos ditches or a line that needs a camera and a locate before anyone can say what is wrong will take longer and cost more. If the town has recently replaced the main on your street, mention it; the plumber may find the trouble at the new connection rather than in your old pipe.