ABOUT OUR COMPANY
Specialist Retaining Wall Removal Experts
At ALMAR Demolition, we provide professional retaining wall demolition services for residential, commercial, and municipal projects across Toronto and the GTA. Retaining walls are built to hold back soil and manage land elevation, which means removing them involves managing weight loads, drainage, and surrounding stability. This isn’t a job to take lightly.
Common reasons for removing a retaining wall include: cracked or leaning structures, outdated materials, or site preparation for a new build. We handle concrete, stone, timber, and block retaining walls with precision, making sure there’s a safe and complete takedown. We also handle all disposal, so your site is left clean and ready for what’s next.
- Registered with WSIB
- We have 20+ years of demo experience
- Our team removes all debris and prepares the site safely for reconstruction or renovation
How a Retaining Wall Removal Runs
- Work out what the wall is holding. A retaining wall is doing a job. Before it comes out we look at what is behind it, how much soil it is holding, and what happens to that slope when it is gone.
- Check what is on top and behind. Fences, driveways, a shed, a neighbour’s yard, and buried services all sit close to retaining walls. Those get identified first.
- Plan the sequence. Retaining walls come down from the top in lifts, never undermined from the bottom. That is the whole safety story with this kind of work.
- Take it down in layers. Blocks, timber, armour stone or poured concrete are removed course by course, with the soil behind cut back as the wall drops.
- Deal with the soil. The slope is regraded, or the ground is stepped back to a stable angle, or the new wall goes in behind us.
- Haul and tidy. Block, stone, timber and concrete are loaded out and the area is left graded and safe to walk.
What to Sort Out Before a Retaining Wall Comes Out
This is one of the few demolition jobs where taking something away can make a site less stable. Settle these first:
- What replaces it, and whether the new wall goes in immediately or the slope is regraded instead
- Wall height, because taller walls hold more soil and often needed engineering when they were built
- Whether the wall is shared with, or supports, a neighbouring property
- Drainage behind the wall, since removing it changes where water goes
- Whether anything above the wall (a driveway, a patio, a shed) relies on the grade it creates
- Access for a machine, because armour stone and poured walls are heavy work by hand
More Demolition Services
ALMAR handles the whole range across Toronto, the GTA and Southern Ontario. A few that often go with this one:
- Deck removal and demolition
- Swimming pool removal
- Hot tub removal
- Shed and garage demolition
- Playground removal
See the full list on our demolition services page, or check the areas we serve.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need an engineer to remove a retaining wall?
Often, if the wall is tall or is holding up something that matters, such as a driveway, a structure or a neighbour’s yard. Many municipalities required engineering to build walls above a certain height, and the same logic applies to taking one out. We will tell you when a job needs a drawing before we touch it.
Can you remove the wall and leave the slope?
Sometimes. If there is room, the ground behind can be cut back to an angle that stands on its own and then planted or graded. If there is no room, which is common on city lots, the wall has to be replaced rather than simply removed.
What happens to the block or stone?
It gets hauled away. Armour stone and interlocking block are sometimes worth saving, so tell us at quote stage if you want material set aside rather than removed.
Is a failing wall an emergency?
If a wall is bulging, leaning or has started to move, keep people away from both sides of it and call. A wall that is failing can go quickly and without warning. See our page on emergency demolition for what happens first on an unsafe structure.
We Remove Retaining Walls Throughout Southern Ontario