Garcetti, DWP Try To Smooth Ripples Caused By $15B Estimate To Earthquake-Proof LA’s Water Pipes

CBSLA.com) ^

[BenLurkin]

In January, the DWP spent $10 million replacing two miles of the facility’s old underground water piping with earthquake-proof pipes.

It was one of five pilot projects in L.A. and hailed by Garcetti as the first step in a much bigger job of outfitting the city with pipes that could stand up to the “Big One.”

But to complete the job citywide would involve installing 7,000 miles of water pipes, which would ring in at an estimated $12 to $15 billion, according to a DWP report released in the fall.

U.S. Geological Survey spokesperson Lucy Jones, who acts as the mayor’s science advisory, says a large earthquake could leave residents [without water] for at least [one month]

[Pikachu_Dad]

Since they don’t know what the earthquake will do, earthquake proofing their water pipes is unlikely to be effective.

Will they care after all their buildings have fallen down?

[ErnBatavia]

Here in the desert, we get an L.A. TV channel...and about once a week there’s a helicopter covering another water main break there.

[Misterioso]

High-impact water bottles—that’s the ticket.

[ansel12]

Interesting, hopefully they will just end up replacing them as they go, but the ability to have water after the big one comes, is impressive.

[Mastador1]

Will they care after all their buildings have fallen down?

If the survivors have no drinking water or there is no water to put out fires? Yeah I think they will care, the question should be, why the hell did they wait so long to start replacing a hundred old plus infrastructure? That is what an investigation should held into. The DWP, as I recall was build huge surpluses and increasing rates for decades, all the while knowing the system failures that were approaching. But I guess it's okay for the government to waste a life giving resource.

[MaxMax]

2/3 of that money will be funneled off to Eco-whacko studies to see if a Slug has a habitat.
150-Billion after 30-years is the CA way.

[jcon40]

Build earthquake proof desalination plants and hand out high - impact water bottles.

Build it and use it now. Leave out Northern Ca water alone. Our farmers need it.

[jcon40]

All that work would be at union scale of course.

A forklift driver’s wage is over $58 an hour....how much bang for our tax buck do these weasels think we can get at those sort of rates for labor.

The politicians want cheap Mexican labor and to pay these ridiculous union wages at the same time

Furious over the idiocy of our government

[DownInFlames]

Cali will be out of water in 1 year. A fools errand.

[bgill]

That’ll be money down the drain.

[vette6387]

“Since they don’t know what the earthquake will do, earthquake proofing their water pipes is unlikely to be effective.”

Quite true. We suffered earthquake damage to a building we own in Napa, CA as a consequence of the earthquake last September. A number of the buildings that suffered major damage had been “earthquake retrofits”done to protect them. The problem with earthquakes is that no one earthquake is the same as all the rest in terms of the way it moves. So they can make improvements, but they cannot make anything “earthquake proof.”