The Fort Smith Board of Directors was hit with the $600 million question during its Aug. 26 study session at the Blue Lion.
The estimate provided to the directors was $585 million to address the aging infrastructure, including increasing the capacity of the Lake Fort Smith treatment plant and the new transmission line that will provide additional water to the city.
Once completed, the 48-inch transmission line will provide all the water service south of Zero Street.
The project is divided into five phases, covering the route from Lake Fort Smith to Fort Smith.
Phase 1: (first six miles) Completed and in use
Phase 3: Under design and route completed
Phase 4: Two 36-inch lines under the Arkansas River
Phase 5: Route through Fort Smith is still under consideration, with several options
Upgrading Lake Fort Smith will cost between $180 million and $360 million. The transmission line is expected to cost between $148 million and $225 million. The total cost could range from $328 million to $585 million.
Lance McAvoy, director of water services, said the costs are based on the current construction of similar projects in Northwest and Central Arkansas. The costs also reflect whether federal or state funds are used.
Much of the discussion centered on the cost of transporting water from Lake Fort Smith, located six miles north of Mountainburg in Crawford County, to Fort Smith and its customers.
Currently, two water lines cross the Arkansas River, the last of which was added in the 1960s, that serve Fort Smith. A 48-inch line was tunneled under the river in the 1950s north of the city, and a 30-inch line was attached to the Midland Boulevard Bridge in 1967.
One option considered but deemed unfeasible was to add part of the pipeline to the new I-49 bridge.
“The age of the pipes is an issue itself, and we’re limited as to what we can push across there because of the pressure implications when the water gets into town, and so part of that $600 million fix is to add an entry point of water on the southeast side,” said Fort Smith acting city administrator Jeff Dingman. “Can we save money by putting this water line on the bridge? We proved that was not going to happen, and even if we had looked at the alternatives to putting it on the bridge, in the long run, we wouldn’t have had the same ongoing maintenance issues.”
McAvoy said that the Arkansas Department of Transportation balked at the idea of having the added weight of a 48-inch line running under the bridge, along with the associated catwalk needed for maintenance, so splitting the line into two 36-inch lines for the duration of the river would be more feasible.
He added that the redundancy of two lines will benefit the city in the long run, as one line can be shut down for maintenance with minimal impact on supplying water to Fort Smith and its wholesale customers in Sebastian County.
“They’re starting the bridge right now,” Dingman said. “We can get those 36-inch lines in on our own schedule when we have the dollars for it. Instead of building a section of a water line that hangs on a bridge for five years before we can put a drop of water into it.”
“Something that hasn’t been brought up. If we were going to have a 36-inch pipe under the bridge, hydraulically, the amount of water it could convey was going to be significantly less than what we can convey under the river,” Ben Marts, interim engineer for the City of Fort Smith, said. “One of the concerns we had was surge pressure when the pump kicks on or off to push the water up into the pipe under the bridge. It’s like being in an old house and turning the water off quickly, causing the pipes to start hammering or rattling. The same thing would happen to the pipe under the bridge, and it could damage an entire section of the bridge.”
Fort Smith already has imposed a rate increase on water and sewer rates and asked the citizens to vote for a reallocation of taxes to help pay for the consent decree. Director Neal Martin (At-Large) said that going back to the citizens wouldn’t play out very well.
“You need funding,” Martin said. “I’m assuming you would come to the board for that. What would that look like? When would we hear something like that?”
McAvoy: “We’re at a point where we are maxing out our plant several days during the summer months. We’re supplying our contract water users (wholesalers) 10.05 million gallons a day, using 2024 numbers. That’s a quarter of what Lake Fort Smith can produce at a maximum. For two weeks this summer, we were putting out 48 to 50 million gallons a day. At one point, we were actually draining our clear wells at the plant because we were producing 51 million gallons in response to the demand.”
Director Lee Kemp (Ward 3): “I think it’s time we had a real conversation with at least [the governor’s office], but if we’re talking about another 1 million gallons a day [in reference to the Franklin County Prison] being added to our demand, and you see this conversation here, it’s money talks. You know? Where are the dollars here?”
Mayor George McGill: “We may need another study session to delve in-depth into what we need and when we need it, and then conduct an honest assessment of the steps we can take to achieve our goals, because the problem is not going away. It’s only going to get worse.”
This article originally appeared on Fort Smith Times Record: Pipes, pressure, price tags: Fort Smith’s $585M dilemma