The Millstone and Raritan Rivers cause many a wet basement in Manville, NJ

Manville has a wet basement problem. Manville is a Borough of Somerset County, NJ. The Borough is 2.4 square miles and has over 10,300 residents (U.S. Census 2010).

The Borough was formally part of Hillsborough Township. In 1929 the Borough of Manville was incorporated after the large Asbestos plant moved into the area. The corporation was named Johns – Manville and the Borough was named after it.

The Borough of Manville is prone to flooding. There are the two rivers, the Raritan River and the Millstone River, and much of the area is low lying.

The high water table causes the wet basement problem

The word table provides an image of a flat surface, like the surface of a tabletop. The water table lies underground and is the level at which the soil and gravel are completely saturated with water. There is often some seasonal change in the water table, due to rain or drought.

Most people know that the water table has something to do with ground water. A high water table is especially common in areas where the soil is not well drained due to high levels of clay. The reason Manville has a wet basement problem is because of the low area between the two rivers gets a high water table very easily. Water tables can become elevated when they receive more water than they drain off.

When the water table rises, it does not just rise at your house and give you a wet basement, because it did not rain on your house only. The rain usually falls over a wide area of many square miles so all this water goes into the earth at the same time. High water tables are often above the level of basement floors or crawlspaces. This almost always causes flooding in these areas.