Earlier this week our customer received a NYC violation after it was determined that their water main was leaking below the sidewalk and into the neighbouring basement. As a precautionary measure, the buildings super decided to close the curb valve and stop the water from leaking into the basement. Once he closed the curb valve and the water leak stopped, it also confirmed that the water main break was on the building side of the valve and not in the street. If he closed the curb valve and the leak continued, it would have confirmed that the pipe was broken below the roadway.
Lucky for the building owner, he had two domestic water mains and they did not suffer from any loss of water. The property still had an active DEP 3 day notice however, they were in no rush now that the leak was resolved temporarily. Unfortunately the city did not feel the same way and a field crew showed up to excavate the roadway and close the water from the city connection. The downside would have been that the property receives a bill for the cost that they city incurred turning off the water. The cost includes everything from machinery, time, labor and material.
Thankfully the buildings super was on site when they arrived and was able to explain that the water was already off and Harris Water would be on site the very next day to replace the pipe. Our crew arrived the very next morning and began excavating the roadway in preparation of removing the existing 2.5″ pipe. After thirteen hours of excavating the existing pipe was completely exposed and ready to be removed for the new piping installation.
Our crew continued to work long hours on an emergency basis in order for the new ductile iron pipe installation to be completed, and water back on for the building. The city inspection was scheduled for the very next morning and successfully approved. The building now has records on file with the city for their new domestic water main installation. More important, they violation was lifted without experiencing any additional issues.
Shortly after the inspection was completed one of our dump trucks carted in clean soil to back-fill both the roadway and sidewalk. We then had two separate restoration crews scheduled on site. One crew specializes in concrete restoration of the sidewalk and another that specializes in restoration of the roadway. The roadway restoration process is a bit more timely due the DOT requirements for restoring the area in multiple stages.
