Ongoing Public Works Projects

Anita Weston, reporter

Rich Civic Times

GARDEN CITY, Utah.  November 10, 2016. Riley Argyle, Garden City Public Works, reported that the third west project will start next summer.  Currently the plan shows the road width is 24’ wide.  A 28 ‘width would be much better, and he feels this road width would be the smallest that the city should consider.  Just a few inches would make driving the road much easier and safer. 

The water line needs to be placed along the side of the road this coming summer.  The sewer has already been laid on the east side of the road along the fence line.  Some of the sewer manholes may need to be adjusted, but that won’t be a problem.

It was suggested that conduit should probably be placed down the east side of the road as well.  Also water connections need to be installed at the various owner’s of property who were willing to donate land to the City. 

A section of the bike path from Gwenda Hansen’s home to the ACE Hardware store needs to be replaced.  It might be even better to replace the bike path from Faye’s Trailer Park.  There are also a low spots at 200 North, 350 South from the corner to Ned’s property, and a low area just before the turn into Buttercup.  The City will begin to work on them as weather permits.

Ken Hansen volunteered to run the sweeper to keep the bike path clean.  The Council noted that he needs to be added to the City’s insurance.  His willingness to help would really be appreciated.  It is late in the year, but there are still a lot of people using the path.  It would be good to clean the path until snow comes.  Thanks Ken.

There are a few sections of sidewalk that needs to be replaced. Depending on the weather, this work will be done this fall if possible; otherwise it will be completed next spring.

A door has been ordered for the red shed.  It won’t arrive for a couple of weeks.  The power box did not pass inspection and needs to be update at the red shed.  The workers will be housing the snow equipment in the red shed and do need electric power in the shed.

There is a meter that is leaking.  Argyle will work on that as soon as possible.  There is a culvert that needs to be put in place and the snow fence on First West needs to be put up before late next week.  The sander and snow plow are ready, but there is still one of the trucks that needs some work.

The water treatment plant is getting new software and a new computer.  The new computer is in transit, and the new software is here and will be loaded as soon as the computer arrives.   When there is a brown-out or black-out, the compressors have to be manually reset at the water treatment plant.  This problem is not easy to fix and will probably always have to be manually reset.  One of the flow sensors at the plant needs to be changed out.

There are about 1300 water meters connected to the City water system.  Reading the meters used to take a couple of days.  With the new software, it will only take about four hours.  Riley is making a list of places that are receiving water, but no meter has been installed.  The lines to these homes haven’t been found.  They have used a metal detector, looked for any maps that may show where the lines were laid etc.  He said he will keep trying to find where the lines are so that those homes will be able to pay for the water they use, not just be billed a standard rate.

Zan Murray, City Engineer, noted that the contract with Elk’s Ridge still lacks two signatures.  However, they agreement is getting closer to completion.  The field survey work was done on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.  Murray will follow-up on the funding for this project and will let the City know next week where things stand.

The overall project is large and has a lot of parts included in it and will cost about 3.5 million dollars.  It deals with the water for Elk’s Ridge that includes buying the Shundahi tank.  The project also includes Raspberry Patch Subdivision water pressure, Foothill Estates water pressure, upgrading the booster station, three phase power and larger pipes to the Shundahi Tank, and a water line from the lower pump station to the top of Cherimoya to increase the water pressure there.  In addition the water line along 300 West is included. 

When the water rate analysis study was done, the projects were supposed to be started and completed.  Since that didn’t happen, the money that was included in the water rate should be adding up in the water enterprise fund so that the money will be there to pay for the various parts of the project when each is completed.

The state is getting ready to begin work on the Third West road in 2018.  They would like to meet with the mayor and those from the public works department in the next week or two to begin getting the plans to start the project.