Politics & Government

Pipeline Project Behind Schedule, Over Budget

A recycled water pipeline installation that should have taken four months took two years to finish. Army engineers said they've learned from their mistakes and plan to complete the next phase of the project on time.

A section of pipeline that should have taken four months and about $4.7 million to complete became a two-year ordeal that's hundreds of thousands of dollars over budget.

Laying a three-mile pipeline along Bollinger Canyon Road as part of the regional San Ramon Valley Recycled Water Project had been scheduled to take only months in 2009.

But shoddy construction turned the project into a prolonged "inconvenience to the citizens and the public,” city engineer Brian Bornstein told the City Council at a Feb. 22 meeting.

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The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers manages construction and planning for the project, which is spearheaded by DERWA – a partnership between the East Bay Municipal Utilities District and the Dublin San Ramon Services District.

“City staff has been working diligently with the Army Corps to make sure that the mishaps that occurred during phase one … don’t occur again,” Bornstein said.

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The delays have snarled traffic and torn up parts of San Ramon's busiest roadway. And it appears that traffic problems, trench plates and construction crews will stay awhile longer – at least through the fall.

To date, that phase of the project has run $264,141 over the original estimate. And the contractor is asking for more money to cover extra time and materials, planners say.

The Army Corps has since assigned new engineers to manage the next phase of the project. There's a new contractor on the job, too – one with more experience with pipeline construction.

The Army Corps oversees the $86 million effort, paid largely by the federal government, to supply more recycled water to the Tri-Valley.

The project began providing recycled water in 2006 for irrigation. When it’s completed, it will supply about 6,400 acre-feet a year to Tri-Valley customers from Pleasanton to Blackhawk and parts of Danville.

Congress appropriated money for the project as part of a national move to beef up environmentally sustainable infrastructure. Local utility districts pay a quarter of the cost and the rest is federal funding, including some stimulus funds .

Army Maj. David A. Kaulfers, who was in charge of the project in San Ramon, said his division has little experience with pipelines. That led to some of the problems encountered along Bollinger Canyon Road in the past couple of years.

Kaulfers said his division deals mostly with dredging, vertical construction and wetland restoration.

But past mistakes mean there's more pressure to get things right in the next phase of the project, he told the City Council. That means sticking to a schedule and communicating with the public and city officials about any changes to the contract, city officials emphasized.

"We want to finish this construction season," Kaulfers said at last week's City Council meeting, "hopefully by fall ... when kids are in school. We’ll just try to minimize the traffic when school is in session."

He apologized to city officials for the problems over the past 24 months.

One of the biggest problems was that the contractor, JMR Construction Corp., didn't test the pipes to see if they were watertight until the stretch in San Ramon was installed, Kaulfers said.

Once they were tested, a slew of leaks was discovered. That finding suspended work for months followed by a lengthy do-over.

Other issues included cutting into city irrigation lines that were unmarked on the contractor's plans. Workers also had to deal with 184 feet of elevation change when tying new pipelines into the existing network, which ended at the top of a hill.

“We are learning ... and we try to learn quickly, as we’ve done in a lot of other places,” Kaulfers told Mayor H. Abram Wilson at last week's meeting.

Residents have complained about trench plates on Bollinger Canyon Road and potholes caused by construction, said Lori Steere, a spokeswoman for EBMUD.

"There was a lot of unhappiness in the community," she said. "This has hurt our reputation, even though, essentially, East Bay MUD has no direct role in the project."

To remedy that, Steere said the involved agencies plan to publish construction schedules and promptly answer questions from the public about the work along Bollinger Canyon Road.

City Manager Herb Moniz said he just want things to run smoothly, especially since San Ramon is holding events in the summer and fall that will bring in tens of thousands of visitors.

People will want to know the condition of the roadways and if there will be any delays, noted Councilman Dave Hudson.

Primo's Run for Education is a major fundraiser for local schools that overwhelms traffic on Bollinger Canyon Road, Moniz said. And the city's annual Fourth of July event typically draws 40,000 people, he added.

"If they find out the day before they're supposed to do the run, there's going to be a lot of angry folks," Moniz said at the council meeting. "So we should make an effort to notify the organizers."

Army engineers said they've learned from their mistakes and plan to keep a closer eye on things and to open the lines of communication as the project continues north to Tassajara Road.

For more information on the project, go to www.derwa.org.


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