NJUS five-year sewer,
water plans set
By Sandra L. Medearis
Nome Joint Utility System board
members have approved a plan that
will direct the extension and upgrades
of sewer and water services
over the next five years.
The plan, put before the panel at a
meeting July 20, looks at the current
system and predicts growth and resources
to order capital projects expected
to total $27.7 million. "We
have a to-do list. The sequence could
be impacted by other federal or private
projects," John K. Handeland,
utility manager said. He added that
the plan schedule itself had been
driven in part by the need to have
solid plans to back up funding applications
due to state agencies in August.
NJUS has been working from a
2004 update of the 1996 five-year
plan. Contract planners used a predicted
one-percent-per-year growth
rate in designing plans for the 20-year life of proposed sanitation improvements.
Based on the state
demographer's estimate, Nome had
a population of 3,468 in 2009. Using
a growth of one-percent per year, estimates
show Nome with 3,681 in
2015 and in 2030, 4,274 people.
Top priority work will be in full
swing next summer—first phase
multi-million dollar project to replace
failing, direct buried "Sclaircore"
water and sewer piping
installed on the east side of Nome in
the early 1980s. Sclaircore? That's
pre-insulated heat-traced pipe. This
work will extend through 2014. The
project also involves rebuilding the
Sixth Avenue Pump House.
This summer crews are working
along Nome Bypass to hook up the
new hospital. Overhead work has
finished. Now the operation has gone
underground with a horizontal directional
drill crew helping NJUS get a
length of the hospital service buried.
The utility is negotiating agreements
with state Dept. of Transportation to
let work get underway to reroute
lines in preparation for a new,
rerouted Snake River Bridge. The
horizontal directional drill, just arrived
on the most recent barge, will
bore beneath the river channel near
both the existing and proposed Snake
River bridges as the least disruptive
approach to replacing utilities currently
suspended under the old
bridge. With minimal disruption in
existing routing, no cost of operation
or additional freeze protection requirements
will be necessary, according
to analysis by CE 2 planning
engineers. Expected to be finished in
2011, the utility relocation cost estimate
is $2.3 million. Year 2011 work
projects have a projected cost of
$6.13 million.
In 2012, the plan calls for continued
work, Phase II, of east Nome
water and sewer replacement and expansion;
a water and sewer telemetry
system to insure secure security
and allow monitoring and control of
selected facilities and system elements;
identification of a new water
source—drill test wells, get site control,
and design a transmission line
from the source to a connection with
the existing system. The total for
proposed 2012 construction season:
$4.5 million.
In 2013, the work will continue to
Phase III east Nome water and sewer
replacement and expansion; Seppala continued on page 4 |
