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River District Construction Update

River District Construction Update

New Sewer System Work Completed

With the exception of a few very minor items, the construction of the new sewer system is complete. The new system consists of approximately 3,000 linear feet of new sewer pipe to replace the previously failing system. All of the residences and businesses throughout the corridor have been connected to the new system.

“We knew that the construction of the sewer would be the most complex aspect of the entire job and it has gone better than we could have imagined.” – Colin Dinsmore the Lead Engineer, HEB Engineers

As can be expected with 50+ year old clay pipes, many of the existing pipes had significant damage. The damage allowed groundwater to infiltrate and cause excessive amounts of flow to the Town’s wastewater treatment facility. With the completion of the new sewer system, there will already be benefits as the amount of flow to the treatment facility should be decreasing

Minor Setbacks

In general, sewer construction has gone very well. There have been only a few things that have slowed the contractor down during the sewer construction phase:

  1. The section of sewer between the Curran Foot Bridge and Ammonoosuc Street was very deep, This required stackable trench boxes to keep the workers safe. This section was the deepest in the entire project and was over ten feet deep.
  2. In order to not disrupt the sewer service for residents and businesses, the existing sewer had to be left in working order until most of the new sewer was installed. This made installing some of the new sewer difficult because the old sewer pipes were made out of clay and are very fragile. The new sewer is located very close to the old sewer, so extra caution had to be made to not damage the existing pipes. Also, the existing sewer manholes were completely made out of brick and crumble easily. In addition, there were several times that the contractor had to utilize large pumps in order to bypass the sewer so that connections could be made between the new sewer and existing sewer systems.
  3. In the parking lot by the covered bridge, an old foundation was found and needed to be removed in order to install the new sewer. Also, several large rocks/boulders needed to be either ripped out or hammered for removal. An old rock retaining wall or foundation was discovered that ran almost the entire length of the Mill St. Parking lot.

The contractor has done a great job of working through these unforeseen issues and staying on track.

Upcoming Work Scheduled

The contractor will soon begin installing the new drainage system. They will start at the Bank parking lot and move west (towards Saranac Street). Then a second crew will start box cutting the existing roadway and installing new gravel in order to pave the parking lot between the Bank and Mill Street. It is anticipated that this work will be completed and the first course of pavement will be installed around the second week of October. After work on the east end is completed, the construction crews will backtrack and begin roadway reconstruction efforts on Saranac Street and the western end of Ammonoosuc Street.

Remaining Work

Construction is on track to have the majority of work completed this year. The new utility systems will be completed and operational. The new lighting is anticipated to be installed and operational. The goal is to have all the roadways and sidewalks reconstructed with the first course of pavement installed before winter shuts down construction operations. Construction will resume in the spring of 2019 to complete the outstanding tasks. Those tasks are anticipated to include landscaping, top course of pavement and pavement striping. Substantial completion is anticipated to be around the second week in May 2019.

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