City of Portsmouth, New Hampshire Public Works, 27 Jun 2022

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From YouTube: 6.27.2022 Union Street Sewer Separation Project

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6.27.2022 Union Street Sewer Separation Project

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Thank you for coming to the union street uh sewer separation project, I'm here with.

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Terry marris, the city engineer, stephanie c, cord public information, outreach bill, corbett.

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From cma engineers, jack from cma engineers and dave fox's.

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City as well speaking of the microphone, so some people can hear it right. I will stay seated.

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It feels wrong to present say.

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So we've gone over some of the people involved: city staff, our engineering consultants,.

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Cma engineers and then stakeholders are the residents in the neighborhood.

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With the best interests in the project.

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Good exactly run with it from here so right tonight we are going to present or be recorded.

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We'll present the uh powerpoint online get some good feedback during the meeting and after the.

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Meeting you got the other ones. Here's a couple people on zoom, but hopefully other people will.

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See it as well and see the conceptual plan, and let us know if they have any other concerns. As we look.

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To finalize the design, so tonight we're just going to review the purpose of the project we did about.

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A little bit at our first public meeting, which was back in february, uh describe what we've done.

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Since then, present the conceptual designs for the roadway utility layout uh and then talk about what.

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We're doing next, along with the schedule and then we'll get some outreach from you guys and there's.

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Anyone else on zoom that's great. If we can get any feedback now and get some public comment.

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So purpose of tonight right to present the conceptual design.

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Solicit feedback describe what we're doing next.

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So to review the purpose of the project, the the primary objective is to separate the.

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Sanitary sewer and drainage pipes so that we have separate drainage outfall from the sewer and in.

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Doing that we're going to replace water, sewer drainage and reconstruct the roadway sidewalk.

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And curving, the separation will reduce the combined flows to the wastewater treatment plant.

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It's required by epa and our consent, decree and new hampshire dds, and will also give us.

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An opportunity to reconfigure some of the sewers that now run backlot through.

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People's properties and relocate them to roadways so they're in public access areas.

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And talked about replacing utilities and then also we'll look to incorporate.

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Some, what we call low impact design, storm water treatment facilities to help improve water quality.

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uh And then again right after that's all done, reconstruct the streets and the sidewalks.

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So here's just kind of an overview of what it is today, so the magenta line there is.

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The existing combined range of sewers, so storm water from the roadway gets into the drains, goes.

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In the sewer with the sanitary sewer, flows runs around the 211 billion uh building out to cabot.

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And then on down to miller and so we're looking to separate that provide two separate pipes which.

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We'll see on the next slide, so that would be the blue pipe would be our new drain pipe.

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And we have to construct that all the way down from union austin and cabot to a.

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Existing connection on miller, um which is going to require some impacts to the.

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Sidewalk on the side of middle street and then we'll provide sanitary sewer, austin.

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With new service connections uh to there and then you'll see some of the orange.

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Patch buildings, so we're gonna, be from here we're gonna be doing some further basement assessments.

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Because those are some of the homes that we've identified, that likely require re-plumbing.

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In order to accommodate this revised sewer configuration, so you saw the.

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uh Backlots, who were there before people's service connections connected to that sewer main in order.

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To get it out the roadway we have to reconfigure some of the plumbing that may come out of the back.

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Of someone's home to the front of their home um and also we're raising some of the sewers we've.

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Got to accommodate some of those sort of services with re-plumbing, so we did the first round of.

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Basement surveys to understand which homes we might have to address.

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And now that we worked through the design, we pretty much located those.

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And we need to figure out the scope of what needs to happen. We'll talk about that. A little bit more.

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uh Right, so what we've done since the public meeting in february.

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Did the basement survey so we got a lot of good information. I think there was 125 homes between.

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There's two projects that are kind of going in parallel: uh willard ave area, reconstruction.

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And then this project, so those two areas uh understand what the services are in people's homes.

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If they have drains and sumps that we need to accommodate uh location of gas services, all.

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Those things coming into the basement, so we can accommodate those better in the project and then.

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Understand which homes we need to likely re-plumb in order to make work with the new sewer mains.

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We did the geotechnical investigations, which is the borings to understand.

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What the subsurface conditions are ledge, groundwater condition of the soil. We reviewed.

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Trees uh did that with the city's arborists to understand the three resources that are out there.

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And then, with that information developed and with the feedback from the public.

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And then, in collaboration with the city we developed.

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The utility drainage, conceptual design and roadway streetscape design.

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uh So yeah there are a lot of significant tree root resources on in the project area.

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uh Union street uh in austin street- um and you know unfortunately, there's it's possible to.

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Eliminate all impacts to the trees, but we do consider the layout of sidewalks.

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Because it's having a tree that takes 20 30 years to establish is an important resource.

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And if we can make accommodations to that, we try to so we're balancing putting new ada compliant.

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Accessible sidewalks in that can be maintained, providing acceptable curved, curb width for the.

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Roadway and we start reconstructing all the utilities with trying to see the trees as we.

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Can so we kind of have three categories as trees? Where should be able to accommodate.

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Trees that we're gonna have to monitor during construction understand if there's impacts to.

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Them and then trees that'll definitely have to be removed because of the impacts from construction.

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So the first public meeting right some of the things we heard and this isn't.

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All comprehensive that some of the areas uh key areas of feedback was.

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They didn't want the carbon curve width to be too narrow. You know it is heavily parked on both sides.

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uh You know, and particularly in the winter when there's snow, storage and other things it gets.

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Confined and difficult to get out of driveways difficult to park and get through the corridor.

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So there was a concern about you know a lot of the other projects, neighborhood projects on the.

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East side of middle and kind of a 28-foot curb and curb width, including the section of union.

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Just east of middle, uh you know opposite this section of union, uh so we re-evaluated what it.

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Would mean looked at several different options, what the impacts would be and how that might lay.

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Out and widened it to 30 feet, which is pretty much what it is today I mean it varies between.

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29 and 31 and a half it's not consistent and parallel through the entire street, so it will be.

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A consistent 30 feet um from state to middle, but it'll be fairly similar to what's out there today.

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uh Right, we reviewed utility service connections, worked with flow assessments to get into homes and.

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Understand what where we may need to do plumbing of homes and what combinations were needed.

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uh And also reviewed some of the oh, that was yeah. The concerns were the backyard connections which.

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Were gonna accommodate with the revised sewer layout and then also people's concern, which is.

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Construction and cosmic core, which we continually need to consider how to get things built in there.

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With with uh sensitivities of proximity, homes and old basements and all sorts of things.

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So yeah I described that that's our our layout, so we have a couple different sections um and if you.

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Can't see well here, if you here, you can get online and zoom into things. Take a look, but uh so union.

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Street from state to austin, one of the bigger impacts will be the elimination of there's a.

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Small grass strip on the north side between state and austin now, but you can't accommodate that with.

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Providing a sidewalk uh on both sides and the 30 foot kirby curb wasn't going to be a meaningful.

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Grass strip that we could do much in so we provided a wider sidewalk there and then a.

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Grass strip and accommodated some significant mature trees on the south side, um with a grass.

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Strip there that varies three and a half to four and a half feet and then from austin.

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To middle there is a section on the south side. First couple: lots: it doesn't have a grass strip.

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For the most part, it'll be in about three feet on either side and a five and a half foot sidewall.

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And then austin will be similar as it is today with a grass strip on the north on the west side,.

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um And none on the east side and it'll all the trees have grown in that section and.

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We'll maintain those uh with a couple impacts, but nothing too significant.

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So we're pretty similar to what's out there today. So with that roadway section and our.

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Layout and they kind of see on there, the impacts to the trees, so the green ones are the ones where.

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Should be able to accommodate well orange is we need to monitor the navy impacts with the.

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Proximity of utility curbing sidewalk construction and then red ones will likely come out.

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uh Because they won't be able to accommodate with the design and the you know, the purple.

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Line is the sidewalk green is grass strip areas and the pavement in between and the yellow is.

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Just driveway access to homes so yeah take a look at that and that's up here too and look after me.

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Certainly drainage is an issue out there. Now the pavement's, a mass carving, is.

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Inconsistent uh so there will be significant improvements from the roads, reconstruction.

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With new, you know minor profile, adjustments uh establishing the crown of the road, adding.

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Curving in consistently along the road uh and then also you know, we're certainly constrained.

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With space in the right way in an urban corridor but again we'll look to incorporate some type of.

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Water quality best manager practices into there that we've used on other.

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Streetscape projects that will treat water before we discharge them into the drainage system.

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And right there's the overall utility layout so again, water main throughout the project corridor.

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On union street austin street coffins court between union and cabot uh and then we need to.

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Reconstruct part and sewer main on cabot to complete the separation and some of the.

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Drainage and then there'll be a new drain line constructed along the east side of middle street.

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To accommodate a new dream out, faulty.

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So yeah I talked about this a little bit and that's going to be our next step. That jack here.

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Is going to heading up that effort, he'll be going door to door and setting up some appointments to.

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Review with a plumber to understand how and what the scope of reconfigurations need to be, we know.

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We need to either re-plumb them to a different side of the home, or they may have to get raised up.

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And so we just need to make sure that works ahead of finalizing the design for the project.

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And incorporate what needs to happen before the changeovers get done. um I think I pretty much went.

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Through most of those bullet points, so yeah, and if it if this reconfiguration is required because.

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We're relocating the sewer main this. The city pays for being plumbing inside someone's home.

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um If it's, because we're moving a sewer main from the backbone, so that'll be done as part of.

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The project and scheduled to be done. You know winter spring next year, ahead of the project.

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So right that individual homeowner plumbing coordination will be upcoming the next month, I'm looking to try.

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To schedule some consolidated appointments with these 12 or so homes, uh and we will be working.

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Through the finalizing the preliminary design or the details of the project through the summer.

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And then really wrapping things up in the fall to try to get some uh bid ready documents ready.

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For the end of the year, so that the project could be good at the beginning of the year.

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um With a plain construction start in the spring, so that's the most optimistic.

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Schedule, but we should be on track right now, barring any major redirections here.

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uh So yeah happy to hear any comments tonight, we'll.

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We'll get to that in a second and then want to make sure that people uh access the website there.

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Is a project specific website, so the things like this presentation, the first presentation.

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And if you really want to dig in and look at the plans, you can zoom into those look at them.

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At your leisure on your own screen and there'll, be some more notifications posted there as we.

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Progress and things come up and there's a sign up for email sign up for notifications.

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On there as well, so that you can get those regular informational notifications.

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Yeah there we go, you got good practice. I am very sorry for everyone on zoom.

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You hit present here and it did not come up for you guys very sorry about that.

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So yeah yeah, sorry about that, we'll we'll redo our for folks on zoom. So you can see what's happening.

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That wasn't making much sense, as you couldn't see the graphics but here's the existing sewer.

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Oh we're almost there we're getting there.

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That's character, yes, eric are you. Are you there.

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I'm I'm here: what are you able to see? I'm able to see the presentation with.

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The slides on the left and and can you go full screen to make the main.

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Slide bigger there, you go okay, so this is the full screen for you, yeah. Okay, again, very sorry,.

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I think we've got zoom by now. Well now we got now we got it. So that's the right. So I think.

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The only non we'll we'll revisit some of the non text only slides and the graphics, so this is.

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This is the existing combined sewer and drainage, and right now it runs back lot around 211 union.

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Out by 34 cabin out on cabin street and the one of the main objectives of the project is to separate.

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That water and sewer, and also eliminate the back plot uh run. You know people from coffin's court.

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And people along both middle and cabot all connect bat back lot across other people's lot.

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To the sewer, so we're going to reconfigure that with what's shown on the next slide,.

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The new separated drain sewer, where everything's in the public right-of-way.

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uh So the blue is the drain and the green is the sewer uh and it'll be entirely new drain.

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Connection since obviously, there isn't one now, because it's combined that will connect.

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To an existing drain, manhole in miller, ave, which impacts the sidewalk along the east side of the.

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Middle and then a new sewer main in the right of way and those I was referring to the homes that.

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Will likely need plumbing modifications and those are the ones that are hatched.

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um Orange in this slide here so in order to get your service to connect out into a sewer main in.

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The roadway you have to reconfigure some of your plumbing to make that work exactly yes,.

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Yes, there's some nice trees.

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So these were the cross sections we spoke about earlier. The union street.

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From state to austin, showing 30 foot roadway width to maintain more or less what you currently have.

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For roadway width sidewalks on both sides, a grass strip on uh so it's grass strip on the south side.

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Between state and austin and then on both sides also the middle for most of it and then on austin.

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Street it'll be like it is today grass strip on the west side and none on the east side.

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And there's the layout, which probably most people are concerned about right so again I.

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You can see the grass strips and the right one of the bigger impacts is the no grass strip on.

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The north side of union between state and austin, which impacts the trees there, but we're balancing.

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Trying to provide a good standard sidewalk that we can maintain um with a good carbon, curb width.

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And we can accommodate some trees and there are some nice trees, particularly on the.

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South west corner of austin and union.

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So we're able to maintain those and some sort of grass strip through that stretch.

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Those are just some urban storm water treatment devices that will incorporate.

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Into the project and then there's the actual utility layout and a little bit more details.

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A bit of a bit of a mess, but generally water and sewer and drainage within the.

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Roadways with water replacement throughout union austin austin's court. uh That's it.

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Yeah, so that's the website and again we'll post it there. But if you.

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Went to the city's uh public works site and clicked on projects. You could find that link.

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See this and sign up for the notifications.

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So that brings us to uh suggestion. Now we got it twice.

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Stop the share stephanie.

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I saw the term backyard sore.

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Yeah, I think I heard you say: 11 houses, we know by now, if, where one of them for that, the orange.

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There that slide, yes, so any of those houses that have the orange background are the ones that are.

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In fact, all right, I think my only other one is with all the work. That's being done. Will there be.

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A lot of times where we can't flush our toilet or run the sink, or I mean there, there may be minor.

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There will be some minor inconveniences when your particular service is getting hooked up that day.

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And then you know you're in an urban corridor with a lot of utilities, so there's chances and times.

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That they accidentally break a main or something like that, but there shouldn't be extended plane.

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Outages or anything like that, they'll likely provide temporary water depending on how they.

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Decide to construct things so that that will be maintained through construction and not worrying.

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The contract will be providing notice, so minimum 72 hours generally for water.

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If there are planned interruptions and then sewer and.

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The road that was my biggest concern and also I know it's selfish, but that I still have my fact to have your dirt sure.

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I forget um in terms of having to have cars out there for the day.

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Like how what's that time frame, and how long is that, generally speaking, okay, and is that.

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For what, from spring to during the duration of the project it'll, be, you know, there'll be there'll, be.

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So it doesn't really, you know, but the street's so narrow to get the pump trucks and stuff yeah.

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We'll know ahead of time is all I guess. Yes, but in general you should play it on.

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Are you ready to move your car at 7 o'clock in the morning if we want to get parking.

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On the side street yeah, um you really should be able to get out at all times.

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Unless they're working directly for your house, which time you'll know before okay.

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And I know it's crazy to ask, but how long are you anticipating this whole along.

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Yeah, that's a good question. uh I don't know if we know the exact construction we won't know until we.

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Kind of get through final design and figure out how five to seven years won't be, though,.

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This is realistic, yeah one two.

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It I mean it one get stretched out because of this or that.

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But, generally speaking, this is not a huge project, so it's not going to take.

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Multiple seasons, okay, might come back the following year and put the finish.

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Okay, thank you.

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Any other questions for anyone here.

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Share the screen, so I apologize uh again again.

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We can leave the we can leave this up.

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So adam you had a question as well.

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Okay, can you hear me now? Yes, yes, excellent! Thank you very much.

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um So I I keep hearing you say: you've measured and you're, not narrowing our street and.

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As somebody who drives down columbia street three or four times a week, um I don't know if you guys.

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Ever drive down that since you've done that work, but you have created a completely one-way street.

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So if I turn on to colombia from islington and somebody happens to be coming up it from middle.

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One of us has to stop if people are parked on both sides, because there is nowhere to go and.

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I'm assuming you measured colombia as well, so I'm just curious when you say you measured us.

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And you're keeping us the same and you even gave us a foot. um You got to understand my skepticism.

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Because I don't see a lot of improvement in the roads here with all this work.

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I see the intersection down at bartlett, which is kind of a disaster. I I don't understand how that.

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Even made it with all those, what is it 180 condos going in down there and you narrowed columbia,.

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State street has been dug up and undugged and dug up and undugged five times in the last two months.

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So I'm just curious about your planning and how your you know our street's almost impassable in.

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The winter as it is with the snow mass sure, adam yeah- no, I I can. I can talk to that.

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So, yes, there have been several streets that have been narrowed and again it's a balance between.

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You know if you have a certain constraint right away to right away, you're trying to provide a.

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Wider right now, your sidewalk is not maintainable on union street.

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And so it's going to be wider than it is today and that's what happens on a lot of these projects and.

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On the section of union street, on the other side of the middle, it was narrowed to 28 feet and, after.

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Talking getting some public input and talking with some maintenance folks, they agreed that we.

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Would skew the balance a little bit more towards a wider curb to curb section? So we know it's what.

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It is today because we've surveyed it and we have the existing dimension of what the curved curve.

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Is and it's not consistent, there are sections that are wider than 30 feet now, but there's.

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Also, sections that are narrower than 30 feet, uh so it's similar to what it is today is what.

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We're proposing to do which would be wider than some of the other projects that have been done.

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So I I mean again that that doesn't really.

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All that tells me is that we have a one-way street that you're going to maintain as a one-way street.

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If people are parked on both sides yeah, so I mean you have you're constrained by the right-of-way.

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With so there's, there is no ability to provide significantly wider than what you have today.

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um You you're, if you're, going to allow parking on both sides of the road, then you're going to.

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Be in this situation, where you don't have 20 plus feet of clear space between the park, cars which.

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I understand the restrictions of that, but it also helps calm some of the traffic and limit some of.

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The cuts through traffic that you might otherwise see so that there's a balance of that. But that's.

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That's kind of a bigger overall issue as far as what what you want to see for parking demand.

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Access traffic coming all those sorts of things, but for us to provide the best balance, we can.

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To try to accommodate grass strips try to accommodate trees and a must of providing ada.

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Sidewalks on both sides that was kind of the balance we struck was a 30 foot.

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Which was wider than what we had considered originally, which was narrowing it down to 28 feet.

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Now I guess, like I said I I'm skeptical, because I've seen all the other roads.

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In portsmouth that have been redone have just gotten narrower and narrower.

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I mean I, I leave town on on middle since you guys redrew those lines from the first bike.

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Lanes over and I am regularly run off by oncoming traffic who are in my lane. That's.

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At least three times four times a week, because the lanes are exactly the width of a car and you put.

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An 18-wheeler on there, they don't make it around those corners and you haven't restricted them.

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So all right, so we're we're focused on union and uh all I can tell you is that that the.

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Existing curb to curb with is similar to 30 feet and that's what will be put back in a.

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Very straight parallel fashion to what what compared to what's out there today yep okay,.

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Thank you for the comments.

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And you're still on to any additional zoom comments.

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Any additional impression comments.

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All right, I will thank you all for attending. I hope you have a nice night. Thank you.