depends on your local soils. If you have sandy soil, that should work. If you have heavy clay, as soon as the underground reservoir fills up you'll get ponding on the surface too.

I would definitely not run the water into the ground. As long as the soil slopes down from the house toward the walk, it will carry the excess water away on the surface. ...Nothing to clog, or fill up. Just water moving across the lawn as it does at millions of homes. But you do need a splash block to make the water go in the right direction and get it a little farther from the house. The raised edging is an impediment to water leaving the bed area at the surface. While the edging may look cute, it also adds a "busy" and potentially cluttered appearance. If the bed is going to be filled with plants why couldn't they be their own simple and attractive edge? If you think you need the raised edging to keep mulch from washing into the walk it might help to know that with planting, mulch is a temporary condition. It covers until plants do. Plants holds soil in place much better than mulch ever could. The grade should be such that after the mulch is placed, it does not exceed the top of the walk. It could be 1/2" below the walk edge. (The raised edging is almost always a case of people creating the problem and then creating a bad solution for it. I do not have raised edging anywhere and I never have trouble with mulch washing out of the bed once the plants are established.)

Thank you! I'm just outside Philadelphia and the soil is pretty good. As for the edging it will be removed. Unfortunately the edging is keeping I'm the dirt and when I mulch it will overflow so I have some. Work to do!

Hmmmm. Downspouts here must be tied into drainage underground, at least with all new construction. It is intended to reduce run-off -- the water must be absorbed and retained on the property. Don't see why it can't also be done wiith the OP's situation, although it does involve a lot of work.

An alternative may be to create an above ground drainage area by digging out the soil in the area immediately in front of the downspout and filling with drainage rock, You can then top dress with river rock for a more attractive finish look. The water will hit the rocks and then slowly dissipate into the soil. Should work fairly well unless you experience very heavy rainfalls (multiple inches in short periods). If that's the case, only diverting the water via underground drainage will be effective.

A good tropical storm can dump more than 15" of rain in less than 48 hours. If you can't get rid of that much water, you flood. If you can't get rid of half that amount of water, you flood more often.

Ideally, the front yard has enough slope that downspout extensions can run under the walk, and daylight at the street or somewhere else that gets it on its way to the Atlantic Ocean.

If you do not own a flat edge spade I suggest you buy one. They make it simpler to scrape off a few inches of soil.

They do make pop-up drainage emitters for this sort of thing. Though might not be worth the cost/effort of running a line under the walk if it's already a quick draining bed.

Here is a link that might be useful: Pop-up drain emitter

Yes, it's a year later and I'm still working on my front landscape. Curious if anyone has a suggestion on what to do with the extra dirt being held back by the ugly raised edging?

I hope to plant next fall and will need to remove a few inches of old mulch/soil before I can remove the old mulch. Then I hope to get a splash block and some rock to create some natural drainage.

Most yards have little depressions where surplus soil can be used. You're not going to remove that much soil as you need to create or maintain slope away from the house.

So looks like I have some shoveling to do ... I like the idea of pushing it back instead of disposing it ... it will aid in keeping water from the foundation, too. Thanks, Yardvaark.