A roofing contractor for a compact city

Watervliet is small and dense, and that shapes every roof in it.

Narrow lots, attached and semi-attached houses, multifamily buildings, and a great deal of flat and low-slope roofing draining to the rear or behind a parapet. Chimneys are common, gutters are working hard, and everything is close to everything else.

Access is a real factor here in a way it is not in the suburbs. Getting material and debris in and out of a narrow lot between two neighbours takes planning.

What we do most in Watervliet

• Flat and low-slope roof replacement with EPDM and membrane systems
• Multifamily and rowhouse work
• Gutter repair and replacement, which is a steady part of the work here
• Chimney flashing on older masonry
• Parapet and party-wall detail on attached buildings
• Repairs on single-family homes

Why gutters come up so often here

Compact housing concentrates water.

A substantial roof area frequently drains into a single short gutter run with one outlet, which is fine in ordinary rain and overwhelmed in heavy rain. People assume a blockage, clear the gutter, and it overflows again in the next storm, because the problem was never debris.

The answers are usually pitch correction or an additional downspout rather than a larger gutter. Where the water goes after it leaves the downspout matters too, since on a narrow lot there is not much distance between a downspout and someone’s foundation.

Flat roofs on attached buildings

On an attached building the roof does not end at your wall, it meets your neighbour’s.

Parapets, party walls and the flashing where a membrane turns up against them are the most common source of leaks we find here, and they present inside as damp high on a wall rather than as a drip in the middle of a ceiling. Getting that detail right is most of the job.

Access on a narrow lot

Most properties here have very little room to either side, which is the practical constraint on nearly every job in the city. Staging, material and debris all have to move through a narrow gap, sometimes with a neighbour’s property on both sides.

We sort that out before the first morning, including where a dumpster can legally sit and whether we need to coordinate with anyone next door. It affects the schedule more than the price, but it is the thing most likely to cause friction if nobody plans it.

Chimney work comes up constantly on these older buildings. Step flashing woven into the covering and counter-flashing let into the mortar is the detail that lasts; a bead of sealant over the junction is the one we usually find. Where the masonry itself has opened up, the chimney needs repointing before any flashing has sound material to key into, and we will say so rather than sealing over it.

Around Watervliet

We cover the Broadway corridor, the 19th Street area, Hudson Shores and the Arsenal area.

Neighborhoods we cover

• Broadway corridor
• 19th Street area
• Hudson Shores
• Arsenal area