Maintenance Update

Good Afternoon, Runaway Bay!

As spring is peeking its head around the corner, things are starting to get busy in Runaway Bay!

Starting this week, you may see crews working in or around manholes across the city. The company handling this is RH Borden, based in Salt Lake City, UT, in conjunction with their local DFW office. This crew will create virtual models of each manhole to provide an objective survey of its physical condition. They will also install flow sensors to determine where the additional flow originates during heavy rain. The crews should have the sensor installations and scanning equipment installed by the end of March.

These crews will work from 7 to 5, Monday through Friday. If you have manholes near your home, please do not be alarmed by any activity around them. If you should have any concerns or questions, please feel free to reach out to City Hall.

Once the sensors are installed and the scans completed, we will gather flow information from the sensors after a rainfall or multiple rainfall events and compare it with the manhole scans to better determine the source of any segment’s inflow and/or infiltration issues, if any are present. Once an issue is identified, we will know the best course of action, whether that is excavating and replacing a compromised line or simply sealing any imperfections in an upstream manhole.

As we have mentioned in previous communications and meetings, we expect most inflow and infiltration issues to originate from manholes. But we also expect to find a few issues in the collection lines. Once those are identified, depending on the depth of the line, we may need to have a utility contractor come in and professionally handle the excavation and replacement to avoid putting our city utility crew at unnecessary risk.

This service, being installed, is eligible for payment with EPA grant funds. It has also been deemed a reimbursable service by the EPA grant administrator. This will, in turn, save a considerable amount of funds for fixing the issues once they are identified.

After the study is concluded, RH Borden will return and extract the sensors and supply us with the flow information. We can then add this information to our GIS mapping program for future use or comparison.

Additionally, engineering continues the rehab of the WWTP chlorine building and the Port O’ Call South and Jim Walters lift stations. We are eagerly awaiting the final plans for each of these rehabs so that we may send out bidding packets to contractors. We have supplied Freese and Nichols with the list of projects for the next phase so they may begin engineering. ONCOR is a big player in the rehabs, so getting everyone on the same schedule can be trying at times. Fortunately, the professional working relationships established by your city leaders have made things run as smoothly as one could otherwise expect.

Finally, I would like to thank every resident who has reached out to either City Hall or me to alert us to any possible issues you have observed. Each reported issue has been investigated and addressed, to my knowledge. Please continue to report any issues you see or encounter to City Hall. 

Roddy Boston

Consulting Operator / RAB Task Force