Is Underground Tunneling Worth It?

Underground tunneling minimizes disruption to your household or business during plumbing repairs and helps keep your property intact—but it comes at a cost. Is underground tunneling worth it? That’s what homeowners and business owners want to know, and it’s what our plumbing experts are here to help answer!

What Is Underground Tunneling?

In simplest terms, underground tunneling is exactly what it sounds like—plumbers create tunnels underground to reach and repair your plumbing. This allows you to avoid the more traditional method of digging large trenches on your property that run the length of the pipe being replaced or repaired.

By working predominately underground, more of your property remains undisturbed. For homeowners, this can mean protecting your lawn, garden, and driveway. For business owners, it can mean leaving more of your landscaping and parking lot untouched. As technology advances, this solution has become increasingly available and favored among customers.

The process involves digging smaller access points through which plumbers can fit their tools to perform plumbing repairs or replacements. We use specialized equipment to bore a tunnel between access points, using supports and protective sleeves as needed to keep the tunnel from collapsing and the ground above it stable.

Benefits of Underground Tunneling

When it comes to installing, replacing, or repairing underground pipes, tunneling offers several key advantages that can make it worth the investment for many property owners.

1. Protect Your Property: One of the biggest and most obvious benefits of tunneling is keeping your property intact. Traditional trenching requires digging up a long path that can destroy gardens, damage tree roots, and ruin grass. With tunneling, we only need to dig small access points at the start and end of the pipe route. Your prized rose garden, that beautiful oak tree, or the paver pathway you installed last summer can stay right where they are.
2. Save Time and Cleanup: While tunneling equipment requires more setup time than traditional trenching, the overall project often moves faster because there’s less digging and cleanup involved. Instead of spending days restoring your property after trenching, underground tunneling lets us complete the job with minimal surface restoration needed.
3. Less Downtime: For businesses, having to partially or fully close the building can mean lost productivity for on-site workers or lost profits if you do on-site sales. Tunneling is less disruptive than trenching, meaning there is less downtime for your business.
4. Avoid Extra Costs: While the initial cost of tunneling might be higher than trenching, you’ll save money in other areas. You won’t need to pay for replacing damaged landscaping, restoring gardens and grass, repairing broken sprinkler systems, hauling away excess dirt, or fixing cracked driveways, parking spaces, or walkways.
5. Tunnel Under Structures: Need to run a pipe under a driveway or parking lot? Tunneling is perfect for these situations. Rather than breaking up concrete or pavers, we can run pipes underneath them. This saves you from costly repairs and keeps your hardscaping intact.
6. Work in Tight Spaces: In areas with limited access or tight spaces between buildings, underground tunneling can reach places that would be difficult or impossible to access with traditional trenching equipment. This makes it especially useful in urban areas or properties with close neighbors.
7. Reduce Environmental Impact: Since tunneling disturbs less soil, it reduces erosion risks and keeps more of your property’s natural drainage patterns intact. It also means fewer truckloads of fill dirt being brought in to replace what’s removed during traditional trenching.

Disadvantages of Underground Tunneling

While tunneling has its benefits, it’s not always the right solution for every plumbing project. Consider these potential disadvantages when deciding if underground tunneling is worth it.

1. Higher Upfront Costs: There’s no getting around it—the initial cost of tunneling is often higher than traditional trenching. The specialized equipment and expertise required mean you’ll pay more at the start.
2. Soil Issues: Not every property is suitable for tunneling. Rocky soil, heavy clay, or areas with high water tables can make tunneling difficult, if not impossible.
3. Space Requirements: While tunneling itself needs less space than trenching, we still need room for our boring equipment at the entry point. If your property has very limited access or tight working conditions, setting up the tunneling equipment might be tricky.
4. Depth Restrictions: Some tunneling equipment works best at specific depths. If your project needs a very shallow or extremely deep installation, traditional trenching might give the plumbers better control over the final pipe placement.
5. Avoiding Existing Utilities: While we always check for existing utilities before any digging project, dense utility areas can make underground tunneling more challenging. We need to maintain safe distances from other pipes, cables, and utilities, which sometimes means trenching is actually safer.
6. Unexpected Obstacles: Once plumbers start tunneling, they might find unexpected obstacles like old foundations, large rocks, or tree roots. These can slow down the project or require your plumbers to switch to traditional trenching methods partway through.

How to Decide: Is Underground Tunneling Worth It?

Making the choice between underground tunneling and traditional trenching comes down to your specific situation. Let’s walk through the key factors to help you make the right call for your property.

Questions to Ask Yourself

First, take a good look at your property layout. Do you have extensive landscaping you want to protect? Are there concrete patios, driveways, parking spots, or walkways in the path where pipes need to go? The more surface features you need to preserve, the more tunneling makes sense.

Next, consider your budget carefully. While tunneling typically costs between $150–$500 per foot, there are a number of factors that can impact the total cost. On the other hand, you’ll need to factor in restoration costs with trenching.

Think about your timeline too. How quickly does this project need to be finished? Tunneling usually requires more setup time but less restoration time. If you’re planning an event, have strict deadlines, or want to avoid downtime for your business, factor this into your decision.

Costs to Consider

Because cost is often one of the biggest considerations, we want to break it down even further. Here’s what influences the final price of an underground tunneling project:

• Length of the tunnel needed
• Depth requirements
• Soil conditions
• Equipment access needs
• Pipe materials and size
• Number of access points required

While the base costs are often higher, remember to take the full picture into account. With trenching, you’ll need to add:

• Landscape restoration
• Hardscape repairs
• Soil replacement
• Labor for cleanup
• Equipment to haul away dirt
• Time lost to surface restoration

When Tunneling Makes the Most Sense

There are a few common scenarios when underground tunneling is often the best option. Do any of these describe your situation?

1. Working Under Permanent Structures: Examples include driveways, parking lots, patios, decks, swimming pools, garages, and home additions.
2. Protecting Valuable Landscaping: Examples include mature trees, tended gardens, expensive ornamental plants, and professional landscaping investments.
3. Minimizing Disruption: Examples include businesses that need to avoid closures, properties that receive regular foot traffic, shared spaces in multi-family homes, and areas where noise and mess need to be limited.
4. Deep Utility Access: Examples include lines more than 6 feet deep and areas that have layered utilities, require precise depth control, or have specific grade requirements.

Make the Most of Your Plumbing with Goodbee

For more than 25 years, Goodbee Plumbing has proudly served St. Tammany Parish, Orleans Parish, Tangipahoa Parish, and Jefferson Parish in Louisiana. We’re happy to provide a detailed cost comparison for your specific project. Just give our team a call at 985-893-1883, and we’ll help you figure out whether underground tunneling is worth it for your situation.

Remember, every property is different. What works well for your neighbor might not be the best choice for your home. Our local plumbing experts can assess your specific situation and help you make the right choice for your property and budget.