Calgarians aren’t alone in the sacrifices they’ll inevitably have to make while crews perform preventative maintenance to the Bearspaw water main next month.That’s because Mayor Jyoti Gondek will be taking shorter showers, letting the dishes and laundry pile up and flushing the toilet less, just like the rest of us.At an information update on Friday, the mayor said she feels the frustration of Calgarians who have had to go without watering their plants or washing their cars for most of the summer, since June.But she said the time and effort — and smell — will all be worth it once the water system is fully rehabilitated..“If you could go back to the ways that you reduced your consumption indoors, things like taking shorter showers when you're running the shower, to capture that water in a bucket as it's warming up, and using that to water your plants or your garden, things like less toilet flushes, things like only a full load of laundry or dishes. I am asking you to do all of those things,” she said. “I will be doing them along with you.”.Unlike June, when water restrictions were imposed within 24 hours of the break, Gondek said the next few weeks will allow residents and businesses to plan for the reimposition of water restrictions on August 26.And she vowed that business like hair salons, dog groomers and even restaurants won’t be forced to shut down. She also said the city is taking steps along the affected route — 16 Ave. and 33 Ave. N.W. — to ensure store front traffic disruptions are kept to a minimum.“We are now engaging actively with the businesses along 16 Ave. and the residents that will be impacted in Bowness or Parkdale to help understand what the construction will look like, what the repairs mean to them, and approximately how long all of this will take,” she said.“This is a very iterative and interactive process where people who are impacted are directly involved in the planning of what we're going to be doing.”.Longer term, the city is exploring ways of increasing the redundancy of the system to make sure flows are uninterrupted in the event of another water main break. That could include the installation of separate lines parallel to the existing one and increasing the capacity of the Bearspaw treatment plant.The latter is already certain given the pace of the city’s population growth.“So that means we will have additional pipes coming out of that Bearspaw treatment facility. This is the situation that we find ourselves in now, with only that one pipe coming out of there, we have to shut it down and limit water flow. With this additional North and South feeder main we will have more ways of getting water out of the Bearspaw water treatment facility.”
Calgarians aren’t alone in the sacrifices they’ll inevitably have to make while crews perform preventative maintenance to the Bearspaw water main next month.That’s because Mayor Jyoti Gondek will be taking shorter showers, letting the dishes and laundry pile up and flushing the toilet less, just like the rest of us.At an information update on Friday, the mayor said she feels the frustration of Calgarians who have had to go without watering their plants or washing their cars for most of the summer, since June.But she said the time and effort — and smell — will all be worth it once the water system is fully rehabilitated..“If you could go back to the ways that you reduced your consumption indoors, things like taking shorter showers when you're running the shower, to capture that water in a bucket as it's warming up, and using that to water your plants or your garden, things like less toilet flushes, things like only a full load of laundry or dishes. I am asking you to do all of those things,” she said. “I will be doing them along with you.”.Unlike June, when water restrictions were imposed within 24 hours of the break, Gondek said the next few weeks will allow residents and businesses to plan for the reimposition of water restrictions on August 26.And she vowed that business like hair salons, dog groomers and even restaurants won’t be forced to shut down. She also said the city is taking steps along the affected route — 16 Ave. and 33 Ave. N.W. — to ensure store front traffic disruptions are kept to a minimum.“We are now engaging actively with the businesses along 16 Ave. and the residents that will be impacted in Bowness or Parkdale to help understand what the construction will look like, what the repairs mean to them, and approximately how long all of this will take,” she said.“This is a very iterative and interactive process where people who are impacted are directly involved in the planning of what we're going to be doing.”.Longer term, the city is exploring ways of increasing the redundancy of the system to make sure flows are uninterrupted in the event of another water main break. That could include the installation of separate lines parallel to the existing one and increasing the capacity of the Bearspaw treatment plant.The latter is already certain given the pace of the city’s population growth.“So that means we will have additional pipes coming out of that Bearspaw treatment facility. This is the situation that we find ourselves in now, with only that one pipe coming out of there, we have to shut it down and limit water flow. With this additional North and South feeder main we will have more ways of getting water out of the Bearspaw water treatment facility.”
