By Carol P. Bartold

Jan. 18, 2017: "On time and on budget" is how Bronxville Village Administrator Jim Palmer describes progress on Phase I of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Midland Valley Drainage Project. Construction on the project, designed to relieve the low-lying Bronxville School property and surrounding neighborhoods of flooding during heavy rains, began during May of 2016 and is scheduled for completion at the end of April of 2017.

After a delay in the availability of equipment, boring below Midland Avenue is scheduled to begin the week of January 16. The work will link the sections of 48-inch force main piping already installed under the Bronxville Library lawn, the village hall campus, and Palumbo Place with the pump house site on Hayes Field at The Bronxville School. 

Drilling will proceed 20 feet below Midland Avenue, beneath existing storm water mains and utilities. Ten steel casings will be installed below the surface, and pipes will be inserted and welded into the casings.

There will be minimal disruption of traffic on Midland Avenue during the work. Upon completion, force main piping from the pump station site to the discharge site, at Laurel Brook near the intersection of Palumbo Place and Gramatan Avenue, will be continuous.

Pump station construction, started the first week of August of 2016, continues and will encompass 75 percent of the total electrical work for the facility as well as installation of two of the five hydraulic pumps planned for. The remaining three pumps will be installed during Phase II of the project.

Construction of the water detention storage system beneath Hayes Field began the first week of December of 2016 and has a projected completion date of January 29, 2017. The storage system will hold excess water runoff for timed pumping through the piping system and release at Laurel Brook, which flows to the Bronx River.

In addition to the force main pipe installation, completed components of the overall FEMA project include the installation of diversion structures designed to direct excess rainfall runoff to the below-grade detention storage system, the installation of the pump station's wet well beneath Hayes Field, and the construction of a stabilized drainage channel at the Laurel Brook discharge location.

The cost for Phase I of the project is an estimated $8.6 million, with $7.5 million for construction and $1.1 million for engineering. FEMA originally approved funding of $6.9 million, which it based on cost estimates that were five years old when it awarded the funding. The agency awarded $5.2 million, or 75 percent, of the approved amount. The village and the Bronxville School District each agreed to fund approximately $862,000, the remaining 25 percent of funding based on the FEMA award.

Palmer reported that Montesano Bros., Inc. has been paid approximately $3.6 million for construction work done to date.

Pictured here:  The pipes and the construction tractor being used for the Midland Valley Drainage Project.

Photos by A. Warner and N. Bower