Oak Park water pipe broken again

Crews were expected to complete repairs this week on a 20foot stretch of underground water pipe that broke in Oak Park.

The damage occurred on Thurs., Oct. 2 under Kanan Road between Golden Eagle Drive and Lindero Canyon Road. Calleguas Municipal Water District crews worked throughout the weekend to repair the pipe, which lost 40,000 gallons of reclaimed sewer water. It is the fifth break in the 8-mile line since 1999. About 100 feet have been replaced over time.

The pipeline is part of the Calleguas Municipal Water District's Oak Park-North Ranch recycled water system, which provides irrigation for North Ranch Golf Course, local homeowners associations, roadway medians and other greenbelt areas.

"We're not quite sure what failed in the manufacturing process that made the plastic not strong," Mulligan said. "The pipe failed our testing, so it was not made properly to begin with. Or however they fused the parts and pieces together wasn't good."

More than 10 years have passed since the pipe was installed—too long to recover damages from JM Eagle, Mulligan said.

The new pipe, made of highdensity plastic and ductile iron, should last 50 years. The fivemonth-long project is expected to cost about $2.4 million. Bids were scheduled to open this week, Mulligan said.

Calleguas plans to keep traffic impact at a minimum by working weekends and closing no more than one lane, she added. Streets that connect to Kanan that will be most affected are Churchwood/Hawthorne, Los Arcos and Golden Eagle.

"Going across intersections, we would need to close lanes on cross streets, so we'll be doing that work on weekends. We will be able to get traffic past at all times," Mulligan said.

Much of the $600,000 repair job includes street repaving, said Susan Mulligan, Calleguas engineering manager. The surging underground water wreaks havoc on the surrounding asphalt.

The latest repair was originally part of an overhaul of 7,000 square feet of faulty pipe scheduled to begin in December. Originally built in 1993, the pipeline is not considered old and should normally last about 50 years, Mulligan said. The line was built by JM Eagle, a nationwide company with West Coast headquarters in Los Angeles.

Rehabilitation projects like Oak Park's are paid for by all of the cities served by Calleguas, Mulligan said. Similar projects are done every five years and are included in the Calleguas budget. The district's water rates are going to increase but not due to rehabilitation projects, Mulligan said.

"This project is within the rehab budget that we established in our master plan in 2006," Mulligan said. "Too bad it didn't wait a couple of months."