Water pipes keep pace with construction
With more than a half-dozen housing projects underway in the Santa Clarita Valley, water officials report keeping pace with the demand for infrastructure.
On Tuesday, directors of the Santa Clarita Valley Water Agency’s board are expected to receive a status report on the number of development projects requiring pipes, pumps and other pieces of equipment essential for water conveyance.
No development moves forward in Los Angeles County unless county supervisors are assured there is an adequate supply of water to meet the demand. Each of the housing projects given the green light by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors develops only with a permanent water hookup.
In a memo dated Nov. 19 to the SCV Water board of directors from the agency’s Chief Engineer Brian J. Folsom, most of the nine major housing projects being built will see matching infrastructure in place over the next two years.
The highest demand for water infrastructure lies with servicing 21,000 homes being built by FivePoint for Newhall Ranch, west of Interstate 5 and stretching to the Ventura County line.
Grading of the area reserved for the first two Newhall Ranch subdivisions — Mission Village and Landmark Village — has been ongoing since at least April.
Mission Village
When it’s completed, Mission Village will have 4,055 homes for sale in the Newhall Ranch subdivision near the western border of city limits.
The first phase of the subdivision requires 6.9 miles of new pipeline, one pressure-reducing station, two booster stations and two water tanks.
The pipelines, the one pressure-reducing station, one of the booster stations and one of the tanks are expected to be built by October 2019, and the others by January 2020, Folsom wrote in his memo to the board.
Modifications planned for the piping of the project’s two wells has yet to be determined. Landmark Village Landmark Village is about a third the size of Mission Village, with 1,444 homes planned for the west side of the Santa Clarita Valley.
Respectively, it requires about half the pipeline seen at Mission Village — in this case 3.5 miles of pipeline — one water tank and one pressure-reducing station.
Although its work schedule has yet to be completed, about 30 percent of its design has been.
Needham Ranch
At least 2.55 million square feet of industrial and commercial development is slated for Needham Ranch, being built by the Trammell Crow Co., in Canyon Country.
The project requires at least four miles of pipe, a pumping station, two water tanks and two pressure-reducing stations.
The first phase of the project’s water requirements — one tank, one pumping station and preliminary piping will be completed by the end of this month.
Castaic High School
With the school scheduled open its doors in fall of next year, the pipes have got to be in place.
Sitting on 250,000 square feet off of Sloan Canyon Road, the state-ofthe-art school requires at least two miles of pipe, one tank and one pumping station.
According to the engineering services section report to be presented Tuesday to SCV Water directors, tank construction is substantially complete, with the pumping station and piping already half done.
Skyline Ranch
Although Skyline Ranch by Pardee is planned to add 1,220 homes to Canyon Country, its infrastructure demands piping across 17 miles, plus three pumping stations and four water tanks.
The first phase of work comprising about half the infrastructure is expected to be finished by spring 2019, with two of the four water tanks built by this time next year.
Vista Canyon
With almost the same number of homes to be built for Skyline Ranch, Vista Canyon — Santa Clarita’s first major recycling project — comes in with a third of the pipes. The innovative project undertaken by JSB Development requires five miles of pipeline.
Its first phase of construction is also expected to be completed in the next four weeks.
The new SCV Sheriff’s Station, taking up about 44,300 square feet and requiring a mile of pipeline, located off Golden Valley Road, is expected to be completed by March.
And, construction has already been completed on the Avanti Tract project being built by Lennar, with 92 homes requiring 3,100 feet of pipe and six hydrants.