A Guide to Water Barriers

An effective water barrier can protect your home or business from a flooding disaster. They can also be used to contain water or chemical spills during construction and other commercial projects. Find out how to build a great water barrier for your property, and why TrapBags® are an excellent choice.

What Are Water Barriers?

A water barrier is a device used to stop approaching floodwater from encroaching on your property. Each type of flood barrier will differ depending on its size, shape, and fill material. Some flood barriers are small and meant to keep minor floodwater from coming through the gap in your door. Other water barriers can form entire seawalls or hold back several feet of water from a flooded river or storm surge.

Water Barriers vs. Water-Filled Barriers: What’s the Difference?

The term ‘water barrier’ can occasionally be mixed up with ‘water-filled barriers’. For instance, some large plastic barriers used to control crowds or impede traffic can be filled with water to give them weight while making them easy to transport.

Different Types of Flood Protection Barriers

Sandbag Water Barrier

Sandbags or gravel bags are a popular choice for water or flood barriers because they are relatively inexpensive and can be found at many hardware stores. Their small size makes them a good choice for setting up water barriers to protect homes, garages, or yards against minor flooding from stormwater. But they are inefficient for large projects such as levees and seawalls.

Concrete Flood Barrier

Concrete flood barriers can be an excellent option if you are looking for a long-term solution. A concrete barrier can hold up to some of the strongest floodwaters if built correctly. An excellent way to construct a concrete flood barrier is to use bags to shape the concrete as you are pouring it. This will provide you with an effective, custom solution.

Water-Filled Barriers

Like sandbags, water-filled barriers are a great choice for preventing minor flooding from getting into your yard or into the foundations of your home. Many water-filled barriers are built in a tube shape to create a barrier several inches high. However, like sandbags, water-filled barriers lack the size and weight necessary to hold back large-scale floodwaters.

TrapBag Water Barriers

TrapBags are an excellent option for large-scale flood protection barriers that can be filled with sand or washed gravel for a temporary barrier and concrete for a permanent one. TrapBags work similarly to sandbags, except they are specifically engineered to be far more efficient. They have been used as seawalls, stormwater containment barriers, cofferdams, and levees. The flexibility of TrapBag’s design also makes them a great choice for riverbank and dune stabilization, as well as spill containment.

How to Use a Water Barrier for Flooding Protection

The first factors to consider when placing a flood barrier are determining where the floodwaters will come from, how much water there may be, and which areas need to be protected. Think back on previous flooding incidents, or just cases of heavy rainfall, and determine where water was pooling and collecting. You may also want to research historical floods that occurred in your area to get a sense of how high the water might get.

Effectively placing flood barriers can take considerable time and effort, depending on the size and type of the barrier. TrapBags use 40% less fill material than sandbags, and a single, 100-foot section of 4-foot-tall TrapBags can replace 8,000 sandbags. However, due to TrapBag’s open-top fill design, a small team using a front-end loader can build a TrapBag water barrier in just a few hours.

If you’re looking for expert advice on how to deploy effective flood barriers to protect your property, you can always reach out to our expert staff.

Why Choose TrapBag?

TrapBags are an affordable, efficient, and fast-acting way to create an effective water barrier. They are designed from high-strength textiles with a pentagon-shaped structure that makes them easy to fill and also helps them create a strong barrier against floodwaters. TrapBag water barriers work like an accordion, with each cell sharing a common wall with the next. Even if a bag is compromised, the rest of the barrier will continue standing strong.

Get Flood Protection with TrapBag

Want to see which TrapBag water barrier solutions we have available? Stop by our shop, or give our staff a call at (239) 674-6611.