More woes for water customers?
Delayed work at roundabout site could add to dam-related rate hike
The cost of installing new underground water pipes where a traffic roundabout is to be created at the intersection of Albany Avenue, Broadway and Col. Chandler Drive could rise now that the state is seeking new bids for the entire project, the city water superintendent says.
Any additional cost for the water infrastructure would be passed to ratepayers, Judith Hansen said Monday, just days after she said the cost of repairing the dam at the city’s reservoir could drive up water usage rates by 20 percent.
“The amount that we must provide to the state [for the work at the roundabout site] could increase if the amount of the water main replacement increases as a result of the rebidding,” Hansen wrote in an email. “The board (city Board of Water Commissioners) has agreed to replace our infrastructure beneath the proposed roundabout since they believe that the actual construction of the roadway will compromise the integrity of our existing infrastructure and felt that they had little choice but replace these mains.”
The state is paying for the road project, but it is not covering the cost of any city infrastructure that needs to be replaced.
Hansen said the Kingston Water Department has bonded $522,676 for pipe work at the roundabout site and gave that money to the state in the summer of 2018.
“We subsequently were informed that the state decided to rebid the project, which will delay the project by about one year,” Hansen said. “The state has not refunded any of our funds, and we are currently making interest and principal payments of about $39,000 per year on a bond for a project that will not be completed until 2021.”
The state Department of Transportation said last week that the need to solicit new bids for the project has pushed the anticipated completion date back to the fall of 2021.
Also last week, Hansen said the expected cost of repairing the dam at the city’s Cooper Lake reservoir, which is in the town of Woodstock, had soared by 140 percent — to $12 million from the original estimate of $5 million — and that if the Water Department is unable to secure grants to pay for part of the project, ratepayers’ water bills could jump by as much as 20 percent.
Regarding the roundabout delay, state transportation spokeswoman Heather Pillsworth said bids submitted for the project were rejected.
“The DOT rejected all bids in order to re-examine the project and associated costs,” she said last week.
The roundabout initially was forecast to cost $7 million, but that estimate was raised to $13.1 million this past March, after the construction bids were submitted.
Whether the estimate will rise or fall after new bids are submitted remains to be seen.
Kingston Alderman Douglas Koop, in whose ward the roundabout is to be built, said the delay provides “an opportunity to relook at the ... project.”
“Letting the project, with substantial cost escalations, proceed because someone else, i.e. the state, is paying for most of it is not necessarily good policy,” Koop, DWard 2, wrote in an email Monday.
Koop said he also has been made “aware of roundabout-related bicycle crash statistics that are very alarming and should not be ignored.”
Besides changing the flow of vehicular traffic, the roundabout is to include 10-foot-wide, mixed-use paths for pedestrians and bicyclists, as well as raised crosswalks.
Kingston Mayor Steve Noble on Monday said replacing city’s underground infrastructure at the planned roundabout site is necessary, regardless of the state project.
“As I stated before, repairing critical water and sewer line infrastructure is vital to maintain our clean and safe drinking water system and wastewater system,” Noble wrote in an email. “Regardless of whether the roundabout is built now or later, the pipes are over 100 years old and need to be replaced. DOT went back to bid because of unexpectedly high estimates, and is hoping to see lower cost estimates with the next round of bids later this year.”
Noble and the Kingston Common Council have authorized spending about $1.1 million for new sewer pipes at the roundabout site.