Council is weighing several possible outcomes for 24 downtown residents who face losing parts of their backyards to the Town for pipe work.

Work crews over the years have found it increasingly hard to access the utility easement on the properties, where a 36-inch sewer line and an 18-inch reclaimed water line sit. The backyards abut the Western Canal corridor from Lindsay Road to 700 feet west of Burk Street.

“We have arrived at five options, four of which are carryovers from the phase one analysis and the fifth being an offering from the residential community,” said Martin Weeden, Entellius project manager at the June 28 council study session.

After residents pushed back against the land grab, Council last year approved hiring Entellus for $225,302 to come up with other options besides eminent domain.

The so-called Option 5, based off the residents’ feedback, calls for installing access gates to the properties with manholes. It also proposes to relocate the reclaimed water pipeline out of the corridor and into adjacent streets.

Moving the pipeline, however, poses numerous challenges for design and construction due to the contested right-of-way and complication with existing utility conflicts, traffic control and roadway resurfacing, according to Entellus.

Although this option would remove one utility from the corridor – and lessen concerns – the sewer and the 24-inch portable waterline would continue to operate within the residents’ backyards with limited access and visibility for the town.

And, it’s the most expensive option, coming in at $21.5 million.

• Acquire portions of the 24 properties and relocate walls/fences to north side of easement. Total cost: $20.5 million.

• Create a utility corridor or an alley by installing a barrier on the north side of the easement, block wall on the south property line and gates on the side property lines. Three parcels would require acquisition of the easement. Total cost: $18.5 million.

• Acquire land at manhole locations and install block wall around manhole to provide permanent access from the south. Total cost: $17 million.

• Leave the existing property walls in place and install access gates at each of the properties that have existing manholes within their properties. Total cost: $16.3 million.

“These costs are only inclusive of estimated construction cost and land acquisition costs and don’t include any other soft costs or other project costs that may be associated,” Weeden said, who added that on average the costs since the previous estimates have increased about 22-32 % due to supply-chain shortages and other COVID-related impacts an inflation.

Jason Montgomery, town senior project manager, noted staff’s recommendation to rehab 10,000 feet of the deteriorating sewer line that is in danger of failure and 22 manholes. The sewer line was installed in 1986 and over time, residents have put obstructions like sheds in the easement.

The sewer line serves approximately 16,000 homes, delivering a significant amount of the town’s wastewater by gravity flows to the Neely Water Reclamation facility at a rate of approximately 3 million gallons per day, he said.

Also, in need of work in the future is the portable water pipeline, south of the easement, which was installed in 1991. The pipeline, takes the drinking water from the North Water Treatment Plant to Cooper Road, serving 11,000 homes in the northwest of Gilbert.

Montgomery said that while making immediate improvements to the portable water line from September 2021 to this past April, an assessment found corrosion and loss of the steel cylinder for a segment of pipe in the corridor area east of Gilbert Road and at other locations.

“To provide some context to how dire this situation could have been, this is the same pipe material and diameter to the pipe that recently failed in Tempe on the US 60, causing shutdown of that freeway and discharging approximately 8 million gallons of water before it could be shut down,” he said.

The 36-year-old reclaim water line, which is along the same corridor, has some degradation and will need replacement but it’s not yet urgent, Wastewater Manager Ken Snow said. The line carries 16 million gallons a day of the treated wastewater for irrigation of large turf areas or to the Riparian Preserve for recharge.

Snow drove home the importance of being able to get access to the pipes at issue.

Recently, the town located a blockage downstream from a manhole inside Freestone Park.

“This manhole is 19.6 feet deep. We’re about 3 feet from the surface,” Snow said. “That means that the north side of Gilbert was surcharged with about 16 feet of sewage underneath the ground. …We were very fortunate that we were able to clear that blockage and restore service before we had a sanitary sewer overflow in particular into one of the town’s parks.”

Montgomery said staff is tentatively scheduling the item to be heard on Aug. 9.

He said information about the issue can be found atgilbertaz/cip. The public also can provide their feedback on the five options at the website.