This may not come as a surprise, but the winters of 2014 and 2015 were brutal, with record breaking snowfalls and cold temperatures.
Erin officials are starting to unravel the implications of the harsh winters for the town’s the water department.
With 44 frozen water services and five water main breaks, Joe Babin was a busy interim water superintendent in 2015. Babin addressed council on June 16 to identify key problem areas around Erin and Hillsburgh and to develop a future plan of action.
“We had 44 frozen services, numerous calls, some we freed up, some we didn’t, some we got right away but ducts on the main street had many issues,” said Babin.
The number of frozen pipes jumped from 12 in 2014, which was still higher than average.
“On a normal year, we might get one (call),” said Babin. In an interview with the Advertiser, he explained aging infrastructure, deep frost during the winter and unprotected pipes and valves were to blame for the 2015 spike in numbers.
Babin said he thought Erin was worse off than the rest of the county because of its lack of a sewage system.
“Because we don’t have sewers, it makes it difficult to discharge the water. You have to jump a hose through your next door neighbour, run it into your house, pressurize the system, and have it out again because if you stop it the hose will freeze… so as much as people were using water, they were discharging the waste a lot,” Babin said.
He explained directing water from constantly-running pipes into septic systems could cause damage, and with the lack of storm drains, it had to go elsewhere.
Babin proposed that three areas – Tomwell Cresent, Spring Street and Church Street in Erin village – be fixed, but no cost estimates were presented. Each area has been scheduled to be replaced by 2020, but Babin is hoping to move the projects forward to next year.
Councillor John Brennan said, “Obviously these are important things that we need to look at … I’m looking at this and I’m saying in terms of not necessarily supporting the recommendations that are included in here but certainly bringing back a report with some costing on them so we have an idea of what it is we’re taking on,” said councillor John Brennan.
Mayor Allan Alls explained the aging system needs to be replaced.
“It is my understanding that the former village reeve actually put most of these water lines in these older parts of town, he did it himself so, they’re old and they have to be replaced,” said Alls.
“I don’t think we have any choice in this because, if we have another winter like the winters we’ve had, we’re going to get a lot of criticism because we haven’t done some work on this.”
Babin will be presenting the cost impact of frozen water services at a future council meeting.
“I’m just working (the cost) out… we looked at how much power we used, how much pumping we used, the wear and tear on our pumps, we are going to come out with numbers for that, the overtime, utilizing the trucks, and the manpower,” he said.
Despite a lack of funding details, councillors expressed concern for coming winters.
“It looks like some of these issues wont be addressed this year, it’s not in the budget from what you’ve said, we’re not going to tear apart a few of these roads and put the pipes deeper so I’d really want to see that we are prepared for next winter as best as possible,” said councillor Matt Sammut.
Councillor Rob Smith added, “I still think we should buy a lotto max (ticket).”
