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Fair Long Beach approves emergency repairs on Park Avenue
Approves $367,500 contract to replace sewer main at Roosevelt Boulevard
The City Council voted unanimously on Tuesday to approve emergency repairs on East Park Avenue and Roosevelt Boulevard after a sewer main collapsed on Aug. 17.
The city’s commissioner of public works, John Mirando, said that a 30-inch sewer main — which takes in waste from Lido Beach and the east end of Long Beach — collapsed and caused a portion of the road to cave in, shutting down two eastbound lanes on East Park Avenue.
“It did create quite a crater in the road, so we’ve shut down the road to two lanes,” Mirando told the council.
The city received two bids for the project, and the council approved a $367,500 contract with Thomas Novelli Contracting Corp., the lowest responsible bidder, to replace 35 linear feet of the damaged sewer line, which Mirando said likely corroded.
"When we looked at the repair, we were concerned that we would be back looking at this again in five or 10 years,” Mirando said. “… Based on the slight difference in the cost of the project, we recommended a replacement, and that pipe should be good for another 75 to 100 years.”
The work is expected to begin on Monday and take about two weeks to complete. Two of the three eastbound lanes will remain closed during the replacement. “Drivers should consider alternate routes as there will be expected lane closures during this time,” the city said on its website.
“We will have to close down two lanes,” Mirando said, “because the line runs on an angle, from about the edge of the middle lane on the north side to almost the curb line on the south side.”
Mirando said that a separate section of the pipe was replaced several years ago. Council Vice President Chumi Diamond said that information about the work schedule would be posted on the city’s website, and she thanked Mirando, Acting City Manager Mike Tangney and others for ensuring that bids for the project were issued quickly.
“I’d like to thank the city’s workforce who went out there and took care of the situation before it got too bad,” added Council President Anthony Eramo.
