Squantum Water Main Break Scandal Exposéd

— News about Quincy from Quincy Quarry News.

Water main break geyser on the Boston Common
A Universal Hub file photo

Squantum water main break scandal exposéd.

Quincy Quarry News was dropped a dime that could explain what caused a major water main break on January 14, 2021 in the middle of Hancock Street in North Quincy between North Quincy High School and the North Quincy MBTA Station.

The dropper of the dime purports that the building contractor who is building 600 apartments, a 1,200 car parking garage, and roughly 50,000 square feet of retail space on a major portion of the site of the North Quincy MBTA station would appear to have improperly tapped into a City of Quincy fire hydrant for water needed during construction and so, in turn, appears to have given rise to the water main break.

A busted fire hydrant
A Quincy Quarry News file photo

Tapping into a fire hydrant for water is a common practice on construction sites.

At the same time, doing so is supposed to be done per well-known standard practices.

Proper steps to do so include installing a water meter to track water use for the subsequent billing of the user for the water so tapped as well as other equipment to buffer the impact of turning on and off water flow at the hydrant.

Fire hydrants operate at very high water pressure.  As such, opening and especially closing hydrants can result in serious water hammering of underground water lines which can, in turn, give rise to catastrophic pipe failure.

SInk holes happen, including to the Quincy Fire Department
Image via the Los Angeles Times

In the case of what happened on January 14, city officials were said to be beyond livid when they discovered near the site of the water main break that the contractor had not duly installed a water meter and pressure buffering equipment on the hydrant that the contractor had tapped as a water supply for his construction project.

On top of the surely considerable cost of repairing the damage so inflicted, roughly two million gallons of water were projected to have so been spilled. 

Up in smoke, down the drain – whatever
A cheatsheet.com image

Per current MWRA water rates, such works out to a bit over $8,000 down the drain. 

Additionally, as water use is a key factor for determining the MWRA’s sewerage treatment bills, figure on roughly $16,000 more in unnecessary sewer treatment costs as treatment costs run roughly twice the cost of the water use charges with both in due course to result in a further $24,000 to be charged by the MWRA for its providing water and sewer treatment to the Q and this cost will be dumped on local taxpayers unless financial sanctions are duly imposed upon the contractor.

Coming soon to North Quincy?
A file photo

After all, there is the option of assessing fines for illegally tapping free city water.

That and the unlikely potential to pursue felony grand theft charges over the contractor so stealing City of Quincy water.

Unfortunately, one cannot help but wonder if the water hammering assumed to have been inflicted by the improper water hook-up to the hydrant may precipitate future catastrophic as well as also costly water main breaks.

A special interests fat cat
Image via ThePeoplesVoice.org

Additionally, there is the matter of why CIty of Quincy Inspectional Services Department failed to catch the improper water hook-up, not to mention that the contractor might so try to argue against paying for the damages incurred care of its purported misactions as it was not told to hook up a meter and install anti-water hammer equipment.

Then again, it is not yet clear if the Koch Maladministration will actually decide to pursue any penalties given that the project contractor, the project itself, and its developer of this project are Koch Machine favorites.

At the same time, however, surely the considerable amount of campaign donations made to the Koch campaign fund by peeps tied to the developer and its general contractor does not have anything to do with anything.

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