By FAY SIMMONS

Tribune Business Reporter

jsimmons@tribunemedia.net

MORE than 180 feet of clogged pipes have been excavated to-date as part of sewerage upgrades at Arawak Cay, it was revealed yesterday.

Leyvon Miller, site operations manager for the project, said the work is currently on schedule and on budget. He added that the project is being undertaken at night and on weekends to avoid inconveniencing Arawak Cay vendors and their clients.

He said: “We have excavated about 180 foot of pipe so far. The project is going from the man hole at the bridge towards West Bay Street. We are estimating that it’ll take us another two weekends to actually make it to West Bay Street. At which time we will close that part of the road back up and there will be no obstructions to the vendors on that main thoroughfare.

“We estimated at the onset that the project would be about eight weeks. What I want people to bear in mind is it is not an everyday project. In our effort to ensure that we didn’t infringe with the vendors and that we allowed them to stay at maximum income earning capacity, we opted to go with night-time work. So it’s going to be night-time and weekend.

“There has been a small caveat that we’ve added recently which is, because of the way Arawak Cay is created, the tide poses issues for us in some instances. If God says ‘dig in the day’, then we have to dig in a day. Outside of that, though, we’re taking every man-made step possible to ensure that, as often as we can, we do all the things that we can to ensure that we’re not infringing on the vendors and their access to customers.”

Mr Miller said the clogged pipes had resulted from an accumulation of grease and debris over the past five to seven years. He explained that the pipe size has been increased from eight to ten inches, and the Water and Sewerage Corporation will be jetting the new lines to ensure that level of blockage does not reoccur.

He said: “The pictures that you’ve seen are an accumulation of what is estimated by the technicians to be between five and seven years of just build-up in the pipe. So what we’ve done to mitigate that from happening again is we’ve increased the size of the pipe by an additional two inches. So we’ve taken an eight-inch main and we’re replacing that with a ten-inch main.

“We also have gotten Water & Sewerage Corporation as the contractor on this project, which means we no longer have to worry about lapses in contract etc with regards to maintenance because it will be a Water & Sewerage Corporation system. Water & Sewerage Corporation also procured a jetter system over the last two months.

“Once they put that pipe in place there will be intermittent jetting of the line, which will prevent that kind of back-up from ever happening again. So we’ve increased the capacity and we have now ensured that the maintenance regimen is going to be something that’s a bit more tightly stitched.”

The lack of a proper sewerage system has impacted Arawak Cay for years, giving the destination an unattractive look and smell. The $130,000 upgrade will allow for increased water flow to meet peak demand times at the site.