In the fourth week of construction, the work on Waitsfield's municipal water project includes installing the water line from the location of the storage tank at the end of Bushnell Road out to its intersection with East Road.
Municipal project manager Henry Erickson said that the installation of the water main on Tremblay Road is two-thirds of the way done and will stop for the season because to go further would require permanent pavement and there is not enough time for soils to settle after compaction.
From Tremblay, work continued on a section between North Road and the storage tank site and work will begin to install the water main from Route 17 north along Route 100 but only in places where the water line is located off Route 100 and won't require digging up the road.
The various parts of the project are being undertaken by several contractors. Kingsbury Construction is working on Bushnell Road. Munson Earth Moving is working on Tremblay Road and North Road. Kingsbury is also doing the work from the storage tank to the water source on Reed Road and the Sicard Company will be starting at the south end of the project and working north along Route 100.
"If scheduling permits we will try to do a section from Old County Road, past the elementary school. We're trying to work off the road as much as possible and trying not to disturb the pavement," Erickson said.
While work on the project this fall has been piecemeal, Erickson said next spring construction will become much more linear without weather and other scheduling constraints.
Erickson and members of the town's water task force were at the Waitsfield Select Board meeting this week to discuss progress and also request approval for a contract amendment. The task force asked for additional engineering funds to cover the cost of engineering the connections from the town's right of way to a property owner's intake pipes.
Because the $7.5 million project came in under projected costs and the town could not reduce the amount of grants and loans going towards the project, the task force asked (and the select board approved) to have the project cover the cost of bringing the water from the water mains in the town's right of way to each individual user. The funding agency will allow the town to use that grant money that way if the town owns the infrastructure, i.e., the pipe that runs from the town right of way to the intake pipes.
Having the town cover the cost of bringing the water to a house/building has led to more people signing up for the project, Erickson said. Currently there are 214 ERU (equivalent residential units - or the equivalent of a three-bedroom house) signed up. The deadline to sign up and have the town cover the cost of bringing the water from the curb to the house is November 1.
{loadnavigation}
