Water System Improvements

Galeton Borough Authority
Galeton, Tioga County, Pennsylvania

LDG provided design, permitting, bidding, and construction phase services for water system improvements enacted by the Galeton Borough Authority in Potter County, Pennsylvania. The purpose of the improvements was to update the water system to be in compliance with new regulations that require public water suppliers to provide automatic monitoring of treated water quality, alarms, and automatic shutdown of water treatment facilities to prevent the delivery of improperly treated water to customers in the event of malfunctions. The Galeton Borough Authority applied for a PA Small Water and Sewer Program Grant to request the funding needed to comply with the regulations. To assist with the grant application and the subsequent construction process, LDG prepared a correction action plan and schematic design of the proposed improvements with construction drawings and specifications.

The project involved work at two sites, the water filtration plant and the Beech Flats booster station both located in West Branch Township. The improvements for the water system are turbidity monitoring at two plant intake pipes and at the discharge of each filter, piping modifications, new flow meters at the filter discharges, chlorine residual monitoring, and process controls, programming, and integration to provide automated operation of the valves in response to elevated turbidity levels or low chlorine residual and provide and alarm notification to borough personnel. Additional improvements were made at the Beech Flats booster station including an automated valve to provide a redundant emergency shutoff and to prevent the transmission pipeline from emptying if the plant shuts down, and a fire hydrant to allow flushing of the transmission pipeline.

LDG developed design calculations, drawings, and specifications to the level of detail necessary to submit an application for a Public Water Supply (PWS) Permit amendment for the construction of improvements. To complete the preliminary design, LDG prepared calculations for chlorine contact time, technical specifications and drawings, and a design engineer’s report.

Following the approval of the PWS permit application, LDG proceeded with final design and preparation of the bidding and construction contract documents. The construction drawings included site layout drawings, mechanical/process drawings, and detail drawings. LDG reproduced existing drawings of the filtration plant and Beech Flats facility to show the new work superimposed on those images. LDG also compiled the final specifications and bidding and construction documents into a project manual. Those final documents were sent to the authority for review and approval.

During the bidding phase, LDG prepared the advertisement for bids to be placed in the local newspaper and the project manual was posed on LDG’s bid plans website. The team received and responded to questions from bidders and attended the bid opening to make a recommendation to the authority for the award of a construction contract.

LDG is currently reviewing received bids and will make a recommendation of award to the authority in the near future.