Reports: Executive Director’s Reports

March 18, 2010

1. City-State Groundwater Working Group - The Working Group will meet again on April 15.
2. MBTA - The most recent readings on Cazenove Street indicate a recovery to the highest levels seen in some months, although still somewhat below what is required to assure the protection of wood pilings along that street. The low groundwater levels along Boylston Street in front of the Boston Public Library, associated with the construction project at Copley Station, continue. The work still requires dewatering which appears to be the cause of the drawdown.
3. BWSC - BWSC will be doing a television inspection of the combined sewer overflows on Berkeley and Fairfield Streets this week to see if they have similar damage to the one on Dartmouth Street. They expect to contract for repairs shortly. BWSC has been working on a number of major sewer rehab/rebuild projects that are in areas where we have had continuing concerns about low groundwater levels affecting the wood pilings. We have seen increased levels, often to their highest levels ever, in some of these areas. The following projects are at least 90% complete: Beacon St, Brimmer St to Charles St; Berkeley St, Stuart to Stanhope St; Charles St, Pinckney to Branch St; Chestnut St, Brimmer St to River St; Dartmouth St, Alley 418 to Alley 425; Mt Vernon St at Charles St; Mt Vernon St, Otis Pl to Brimmer St; Trinity Pl, St James Ave to Stuart St; Canal St, Causeway St to Market St; Church St, Winchester St to Melrose St; Lancaster St, Causeway St to Merrimac St; Park Plaza, Arlington St to Hadassah Way; Stuart St, Columbus Ave to Church St; Border St, Maverick St to Condor St; Central Square from Border St; Norway St at Hemenway St; Summer St, Melcher St to A St; Aguadilla St, Tremont to San Juan St; Appleton St, W Canton St to Dartmouth St; Bond St, Hanson to Milford St; Chandler St at Clarendon St; Chandler St, Columbus Ave to Clarendon St; Clarendon St, Warren Ave to Chandler St; Columbus Ave, Braddock Park to Clarendon St; Drapers Lane, Ivanhoe St to Upton St; Hanson St, Tremont St to Shawmut Ave; Milford St, Tremont to Taylor St; San Juan St at W Brookline St; Tremont St at E Berkeley Se; Tremont St, Milford St to Alley 705; Tremont St, W Newton St to Aguadilla St; Upton St, Drapers Lane to Shawmut Ave; Warren Ave, Clarendon St to Berkeley St; Warren Ave, W Brookline St to W Canton St; W Canton St, Tremont St to Alley 543.
4. MWRA - MWRA is nearing completion of its major sewer replacement project in East Boston. The sewer pipe under Porter Street that is in the area where extremely low groundwater readings occur consistently will be discontinued and filled in by the end of the summer.
5. MassDOT - They are continuing with design work for modifications to the drainage system from the Central Artery. The decision on whether and where to introduce recharge awaits completion of some of BWSC’s repair projects and a determination of whether the recharge would be a benefit in the areas into which it can be introduced. Decisions should be made in the summer.
6. GCOD - GCOD compliance continues to be excellent. The Board of Appeals has ruled on over 160 applications, with only two not being able to completely comply with recharge requirements. Over 80 recharge systems are installed and operating.
7. Research Projects - We have received the interim report from Professor Vogel, and the Technical Advisory Committee was briefed on the findings yesterday. The research has found a small, but statistically significant positive impact on groundwater levels associated with individual recharge systems. They have developed a model and are refining it to allow the prediction of this impact. At this point, they feel that the model accurately represents the impact of any individual recharge on any well in Back Bay. They are refining the model to better represent the impact of multiple recharges at any single point. They plan to present an interim paper at a conference in Rhode Island in May. Professor Vogel is confident that they will have an accurate and refined multipoint model and a paper explaining it in terms understandable to the general public by the end of the summer.
8. Website - Traffic to the website continues high. We have experienced some lack of reliability in the availability of the interactive map, apparently caused by inadequacies of the shared server arrangement. We are working with our consultant to remedy this, probably by moving the map to a different server.
9. Meetings - I had a productive meeting with the membership of the Union Park Neighborhood Association to explain the groundwater issue and efforts undertaken to alleviate it to them. Christian and I met with the Goethe Institute to discuss apparent piling problems in their building on Beacon Street.