Holding back a flood...if it happens again

Posted 7/19/16

For those who didn't see it, it's hard to imagine a Pawtuxet River so flooded that it closed a section of Route 95, swamped neighborhoods and the Warwick Mall, and inundated the city's wastewater treatment plant. The scars of the March

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Holding back a flood...if it happens again

Posted

For those who didn’t see it, it’s hard to imagine a Pawtuxet River so flooded that it closed a section of Route 95, swamped neighborhoods and the Warwick Mall, and inundated the city’s wastewater treatment plant.

The scars of the March 2010 floods are gone. The memory lives on in video clips, photographs, and stories like those of Mayor Scott Avedisian, who to this day recalls the weight of having to tell city residents to hold off flushing their toilets.

Bringing the wastewater treatment plant back online and repairing the damage in the wake of the flood cost $14 million. From those first days when the water receded and the Warwick Sewer Authority resumed operations, the plan was to ensure this wouldn’t happen again; that floodwaters would never swamp the treatment plant. The answer seemed obvious – raise the levee and the plant would stay dry.

But raising the levee hasn’t been as easy as it seems.

Consider that the levee was built to withstand the 100-year storm. It did its job for the March 14 storm when river waters swirled within a couple of feet from pouring over the earthen berm. The March 29 through April 1 storm delivered an estimated 8.8 inches of rain, and it was just too much. Over 38 days, the state received 21.15 inches of rain. The river crested at about three feet above the levee. The levee was underwater, as were treatment pools, administrative offices, and the adjoining Warwick Animal Control Shelter.

The city wasn’t going to settle for repairs to the levee only. It wanted the added protection of another five to six feet in height – a levee that could buffet the floodwaters of a 500-year storm.

The plan seemed simple enough – just pile on some more dirt and that would take care of it.

Of course, that’s not the way it’s worked out.

The levee has been on the agenda of virtually every Warwick Sewer Authority meeting and a topic of updates to the City Council for the last several years. It’s one of those issues that just seems to have a life of its own.

As the western side of the existing levee borders river lowlands, which face restrictions when it comes to broadening the base of the levee so as to increase its height, Hart Engineering was the contractor completing the project of interlocking composite sheathing to act as a “wall” on top of the levee. When it came to driving the sheathing into the ground, however, contractors encountered boulders that had not been shown in the plans for the original levee. The sheathing, which the WSA had bought, was now useless. The material is stockpiled at the plant and WSA executive director Janine Burke Wells remains hopeful of finding a buyer to recoup some of the $300,000 spent.

“We’re trying to recover some of the money from that,” she said in an interview Tuesday.

More to the point, Burke Wells is hopeful the levee nightmare is drawing to a close.

She said DiGregorio Corporation of Smithfield, one of five bidders, has been awarded a $2,465,460 contract to complete 1,800 linear feet of levee work that includes raising the troublesome western levee with concrete walls. Hart Engineering is completing the levee in a low area next to Route 95.

Burke Wells said the overall $4.5-million cost of elevating the levee to meet a 500-year storm is covered by the $3.6-million Federal Emergency Management grant. The WSA will need to make up the difference.

Burke Wells said the authority would need to borrow funds to cover its share. She said the authority is considering “the liability” concerning design and engineering that could recover some costs.

At $4.5 million, she considers the money a wise investment based on what it cost to rebuild the plant after the flood of 2010.

Heaven knows, it just hasn’t been easy to accomplish.

Comments

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  • richardcorrente

    Why can't we return it to the manufacturer we bought it from? Isn't there some sort of guarantee, some sort of return policy?

    Can't they just sell it to someone else?

    Why can't we replace it with "interlocking sheathing" that can withstand the added stress of this rocky terrain?

    Why can't Hart Engineering help with the solution?

    What about the DiGregorio Corporation who are receiving $2,465,460? Can they help? Can they use it elsewhere?

    Can they find a way to make this sheathing work?

    This is seemingly a simple problem to solve. One of these parties has to have an answer.

    Why are we making our taxpayers pay for it? Shouldn't someone else pay? Seems like it to me.

    Richard Corrente

    Endorsed Democrat for Mayor

    Tuesday, July 19, 2016 Report this

  • exportbw

    I recall driving by and seeing a building in the middle of the lake. Once the project is completed, to raise the levee, I am wondering what area of Warwick will receive this "extra" water that wasn't part of the 500 year flood plain. Someone downstream will eventually pay for it. Just curious.

    Tuesday, July 19, 2016 Report this

  • RISchadenfreude

    Warwick (and Cranston) residents are paying for the "sins" of the past. Homes that were built on flood plains in Cranston make the old-timers shake their heads- "what fool would buy a house on land that floods when the river crests?" (fools who don't do their homework prior to buying a house and the unscrupulous developers who built them). Folks who know the history of Warwick before the malls and the I-295 causeway remember potato farms (rich soil provided by silt from floods) and wetlands which used to allow the Pawtuxet a place to flood. In the name of development and profits for a few, a great many more Cranston, Warwick and West Warwick residents are exposed to flooding which costs millions and endangers the lives of our citizens.

    It only seems fitting when the malls flood and remind them of what that area used to be, giving them a taste of what Cranston and Warwick and West Warwick residents have had to endure for the sake of profits.

    Wednesday, July 20, 2016 Report this

  • Reality

    How much longer are we going to allow this incompetence to continue..........heads should be rolling at the WSA.

    Wednesday, July 20, 2016 Report this