Aqua to Kick off New Year With Longest Local Water Main Replacement Project in Decades
December 14, 2023 -- Aqua is announcing plans to replace more than a mile of water main along Mount Vernon Avenue beginning in January with a budget of $3,163,860. Signs announcing the project and traffic impacts will be installed along the route beginning Monday, December 18. Construction will begin at the Mount Vernon Avenue and Church Street intersection and end at Forest Lawn Boulevard. To minimize traffic impacts Aqua has broken the project into four phases.
“This is a really large project that will continue into the summer. We’ll keep the public and area drivers informed about our progress with regular announcements,”said Aqua Ohio’s Area Manager Scott Ballenger. “This project will double the size of the pipe that supplies service to our customers in eastern Marion County.”
The scope of the entire project includes:
- Replacing 5,900 linear feet of 120 year old, six-inch cast iron water main with 12-inch ductile iron pipe along Mount Vernon Avenue from Church Street to Forest Lawn Boulevard.
- Connecting 71 customers to the main with new service lines for the company-owned portion of the service and informing customers if the service line they own is lead and should be replaced.
- Increasing the number of fire hydrants in the area from 12 to 15 to improve fire protection and the number of valves from 20 to 44 to help isolate disruptions during future repairs or maintenance.
- Initiating construction the first week of January and taking approximately six months.
Phase one of the project includes:
- Replacing the water main between Church Street to Bradford Street.
- Connecting 14 customers to the main.
- Installing three fire hydrants and six new valves.
- This phase of the project will begin the first week of January and take approximately five weeks to complete, weather permitting.
Phase one traffic note: During this portion of the project, westbound traffic will be maintained but lane closures and parking restrictions will be necessary in active construction areas. Eastbound traffic will be detoured down East Church Street to Sargent Street to East Center Street to U.S. 23.
Lawn restorations will be completed in the fall of 2024. Water service will be maintained throughout construction. However, customers receiving new service lines will experience short-term interruptions while their services are connected to the new main near the end of the project. Those customers will be notified by Aqua in advance of the planned interruptions.
Underground Utilities Inc. of Monroeville, OH was selected to perform the work. In addition to this $3.1million project, Ballenger said the company expects to spend more than $65million across Aqua’s 40 Ohio systems in 2024, approximately $10million of that will be invested in the Marion area.
Given the scope of this project, and its impact on Marion traffic, Aqua is concentrating construction activities into four phases. We intend to issue project update press releases to you prior to each phase.
