Mayor Jyoti Gondek is calling for a citywide examination of Calgary’s below-ground water infrastructure, in the wake of the ruptured feeder main that has reduced the city’s water supply and led to outdoor watering restrictions and a fire ban for the last 16 days.
Gondek said she’ll be asking administration “what we need in the budget” at Tuesday’s city council meeting to ensure Calgary has the required technology and inspection methods to fully understand the current state of the city’s water distribution network.
“Like all of you, I want to be sure we have a clear line of sight on what our infrastructure looks like under the ground in Calgary,” Gondek said during her morning briefing Friday on the water crisis that began on June 5.
“You can bet I’ll be calling in all favours from the provincial and federal governments,” Gondek added. “They’ve been generous in saying they’ll be ready to step up and support as needed.”
The city’s water pipeline network encompasses more than 5,000 kilometres of below-ground pipe and delivers water to approximately 1.6 million customers in Calgary, Airdrie, Chestermere, Tsuut’ina Nation and Strathmore.
City officials have claimed 98 per cent of the pipes are currently in good condition. At a briefing earlier this month, Gondek said the city has spent nearly $300 million to maintain and repair pipes throughout the network over the last six years.
Water usage creeping up
Since the start of Calgary’s water emergency, the city has used nearly two billion litres of water less than the same time period last year.
“This amazing number goes to show how when we work together, even the small decisions we make amount to a lot,” Gondek said, noting conservation efforts like shorter showers and reusing captured water are working.
“All those small decisions matter and they add up.”
But while Calgary’s cumulative water usage has remained below a 480-million-litre threshold for the last six consecutive days, officials noted there has been a recent uptick in demand, with 460 million litres reported on Thursday, compared to 454 million on Wednesday and 445 million on Tuesday.
Calgary has been under a declared state of local emergency since last Saturday, and CEMA chief Sue Henry said Friday that the declaration has been extended by an additional week.
With warm weather in the forecast, she urged Calgarians to keep conservation top of mind and find creative ways to keep cool this weekend.
“Please remember the fire ban and water restrictions remain in effect,” she said.
Since June 5, bylaw officers have issued 14 tickets related to water restriction violations. Many of these were related to automatic sprinkler systems, according to Henry, who added the city has also issued five tickets for fire ban contraventions.
Repairs continue on ‘hot spots’
Meanwhile, work continues to repair the five “hot spots” on the Bearspaw South feeder main, with a potential target timeline of restoring the critical water artery by July 5.
The city’s general manager of infrastructure services, Michael Thompson, said crews continue to cut and remove the damaged pieces pipe, with that step expected to be completed by the end of Friday.
Sandblasting and epoxy coating of the two segments of pipe that arrived from San Diego were also nearing completion as of Friday’s briefing, which are necessary to prepare those pieces for installation.
For the one hot spot that cannot safely be removed due its location in a thrust block, Thompson said crews are preparing to structurally reinforce that section with rebar and concrete.
Thompson said the city has posted a new FAQ section on its website to respond to some of the more “technical” questions officials have fielded in the daily briefings about the city’s water infrastructure.
He reiterated, however, that a lot of those questions won’t be answered until the completion of a third-party post-incident review.
“The experts we rely on to supply these technical answers are also the experts all Calgarians are currently relying on in the field to support the effective repair and return of our water service,” he said.
Gondek also said Calgary will be sharing findings of the third-party review with other municipalities and the Big City Mayors Caucus to apply learnings to other jurisdictions.
“If this could happen here, in a relatively young city like ours, it’s possible it could happen anywhere,” she said.