ORANGE — A sinkhole that opened over the Juneteenth weekend on East Main Street has exposed a pressing infrastructure issue — a 4,000-foot stretch of 1800s-era clay sewer pipe officials say urgently needs replacement.
“We had a sinkhole open up on East Main Street and the highway department responded with the police department to work a detail,” said Town Administrator Matthew Fortier during the June 25 Selectboard meeting. Later adding, “The pipe on East Main Street is a clay pipe from the 1800s. It’s a huge I&I [Infiltration and Inflow] issue for the town.”
Fortier said emergency excavation work revealed that while sections of the pipe had been repaired over the years as various sinkholes have popped up, the entire line now needs to be replaced.
“You’re looking at about four thousand feet of pipe along that road that really should be replaced,” Fortier told the board.
(Photo Credit: AOTV)
Fortier suggested beginning with a closed-circuit television (CCTV) inspection of the full line to assess its condition and help inform the development of a phased infrastructure plan.
“I don’t know if there’s any appetite tonight to talk about what we want to do for a long-range plan,” Fortier said. “But it definitely should be on the list for next year as we get into capital requests.”
Selectboard member Jane Peirce responded saying that in terms of long-term strategy, the town needs to apply for financial assistance for a “broad-based infrastructure replacement project” through the State Revolving Fund Financial Assistance Program, which offers zero-percent interest loans with partial forgiveness for approved infrastructure projects. “We’re in a very good economic position to borrow money from that entity,” she said. “The problem is not going to get better. The pipe is not going to heal.”
Fortier said the cost estimate for full replacement is currently around $560,000, based on “some preliminary napkin math.”
“We’re thinking about $140 a foot or so,” Fortier added. “I think that while it’s expensive, having to detour East Main Street is economically expensive to the area, and, considering how bad the I&I is that we discovered with that pipe — that is over 100 years old — I think you would also benefit from [addressing] that issue, where you have a lot of flow coming in unnecessarily from that side of town. So it’d be well worth it to look at replacing that section while they’re continuing to work on that 20-year sewer asset management plan.”
Peirce agreed, pointing out the effect on wastewater treatment capacity. “The I&I problem is causing extra water to go into the wastewater treatment plant, which is causing DEP [Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection] to say don’t do any more hookups because you’re at capacity,” she said. “But if we didn’t have all the stormwater going in there, we wouldn’t have that problem. We have plenty of capacity, and now we need to upgrade. So it’s kind of a win-win situation if we go for it.”
Although the Selectboard did not issue a formal directive, the discussion concluded with Fortier stating he would follow up with the Department of Public Works and engineer Chris Stoddard of Stoddard Engineering in Athol to begin a preliminary investigation.
