Irpin, Shchasliva Street: Private sector flooded by rain — city orders new drainage system project
Residents of Shchaslyva Street and Pivernyi Lane have been suffering from flooding after every rainfall for years. The existing storm sewer system is physically not designed for modern volumes of precipitation — the city has finally officially acknowledged this and is launching the design of a new system.
By Tetiana Suchkova-Ladik
April 8, 2026 · 2 min read
After meeting with citizens, First Deputy Mayor of Irpin Oleksandr Pashchynskyi announced that a new storm sewer system — more powerful than the existing one — will be designed in the area of Shchaslyva Street and Pivnichnyi Lane. The reason for the decision is simple: after each rainfall, basements and yards of private houses are flooded with water.
Old pipes, new reality
Storm sewerage in Irpin's private sector is infrastructure that has gone untouched for years. It was designed according to different water drainage standards and for a different climate. Today, the intensity of rainfall in Central Ukraine is increasing: shorter but more powerful downpours are no longer an exception but a statistical norm. Systems that "coped" 20 years ago simply cannot keep up with water drainage.
«One of the appeals concerned systematic flooding of private houses in the area of Shchaslyva Street and Pivnichnyi Lane during rainfall. The existing storm sewer system cannot handle the volume of precipitation»
Oleksandr Pashchynskyi, First Deputy Mayor of Irpin
The solution is to order design and estimate documentation for a new storm sewer system calculated for actual loads. This is the first and mandatory step before any construction: without a project there is no estimate, without an estimate — no funding.
Why this matters now
Irpin is restoring infrastructure after the 2022 occupation — and in this context, storm sewerage in the private sector easily gets lost among priorities. But flooding is not merely an aesthetic problem. Water in basements destroys foundations, causes mold, and renders cellars unusable — essentially food storage facilities for many families in the private sector.
- Design — first stage: determining the route, calculating capacity, specifying materials.
- Estimate — second: without it, the city cannot submit an application for either municipal budget or donor funding.
- Construction — third: timelines depend on what the estimate will be and where the money comes from.
No specific dates or funding sources have been announced yet — only a decision to design. This is honest but early stage: in Ukrainian realities, more than a year may pass between «we ordered a project» and «we laid the pipes.»
A telling fact: the appeal came through a personal meeting rather than official petitions or deputy requests. So the mechanism worked — but only because someone came in person. The question is whether a public design schedule with control dates will appear — or will residents learn about progress the same way they learned about the problem: at the next meeting a year later.
