Pickerington is investing in its infrastructure to keep pace with the increased demands of a growing community.
In 2014, approximately $4 million in water and wastewater improvements – a historic number of projects – will get underway to make sure the service that Pickerington residents expect continues without interruption for years to come.
One of the major upgrades planned is the raw water line reactivation, which will convert the 10-inch water line that was used to pump untreated water from the Hereford well fields to the Diley Road treatment plant, and then to a finished water distribution line.
Service Director Ed Drobina said the conversion of the line will increase the flow of water to fire hydrants in the RaMar and Pickerington Hills subdivisions and along Opportunity Way, and it will provide a better system to connect different sections of the water distribution system in the event of a main line break or needed water for fire protection.
To further increase the capacity of available water, the City is planning to drill a new water well in the Diley Road area, bolstering the water supply for new development.
Pickerington is also upgrading its reverse osmosis (RO) discharge line to take waste from the RO system out of the treatment stream of the wastewater treatment plant.
“We operate the RO system at an approximate 80 percent recovery rate, which means that about 20 percent of the water pumped from the water wells goes to waste,” Drobina said. “Our goal with the project is to take the waste from the RO system around the treatment stream of the wastewater plant and discharge it directly into the effluent of the water plant, thus saving treatment capacity of the plant.”
To increase the capacity of one of the lift stations on Leasure Drive that was installed more than 10 years ago to serve a certain tributary area, the City is upgrading the lift station to handle more flow and provide better service for new development along the western section of Refugee Road.
The Sycamore Creek Relief Sewer project will also ease a bottleneck in the collection system.
Currently, a 30-inch sewer line flows from the eastern part of Pickerington and connects to a 15-inch line. This 15-inch clay sewer line will be replaced with a 30-inch line from Lockville Road to the wastewater plant.
In addition to upgrading lines and drilling a water well in 2014, the City is improving its emergency alert systems to make sure equipment operates more efficiently and measures are in place to quickly respond to challenges.
Improvements recently made to the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition System at the wastewater plant allow an operator to receive a detailed message on a smart phone if an alarm goes off at the plant or any of the five lift stations.
Wastewater treatment operators are also now able to remotely access the plant from an iPad so they can immediately check on the plant and make adjustments, if needed, to the operating system, turn pumps on or off and switch to back-up equipment.
Drobina said the City is making these advances in its water and sewer infrastructure because it is important now to invest in the future of Pickerington.
