'Ballparking' RWSA: Record low water use and record high RFP?

HDR knows when it's got a good thing.

The Hook again shows just how sloppy its reporting is for this topic:

"New data show that the community is using one fifth less water than a decade ago. The latest figures show use of just 43.6 million gallons during first five months of 2011. That's 20 percent less than the 54.55 million gallons drawn during the first six months of 2001.."

Any intelligent reader will see through that comparison. Of course we used less water - you're comparing 5 months of use one year with 6 months of use in another year. Why don't you go ahead and compare the first 5 months this year with all of the past decade and say we're using 98% less water. It's the same silly thing. Plus, we're just now getting into the dry part of the year when water use goes way up by all those people who irrigate all summer. Why spend $40 million to dredge (plus $220,000 just to do the proposal) when you can have twice the water for half the cost with the new dam?

I call on readers to refute The Hook's bad-boy bully journalism and boycott their advertisers. They're wrong again!

@samuel ... I'm a reader ready to refute... but not the Hook.
If you're so intelligent a reader, why don't you factor into your brilliant calculations that population has increased by.... look it up. It's public info ... after all, we just had a census.
Hint, the calculation is going to dwarf your one month find.
Apples to apples.. we're looking at water use closer to 30% less. Get with the 21st century.

Lorax - Hook is also comparing water use during the most severe economic recession in 80 years with current use. People lost hundreds of jobs, businesses went bankrupt, commercial, industrial, and residential building came to a jarring halt. And so, too, did water use. Once again, a horrible comparison that is inflammatory journalism without any rational logic or reason - just smut. Sorry, Hook and Lorax, your bad-boy bully arguments - or spin - aren't fooling people anymore.

Lorax and samuel are both right but to different degrees. The effects of the recession are likely minor as water demand is largely insensitive to economic conditions in our community. The Demand Study will provide more detailed investigation into this but my guess Lorax is far more realistic than samuel.

BUT you are both missing the point! Remember that if the demand growth resumes its worst estimate we DO NOT NEED ANY NEW RESERVOIRS FOR DECADES IF WE JUST START "SMALL BITES" DREDGING soon. Who in their right mind would gamble that the current assumptions will be correct for our grandchildren? Why spend all this money in the worst debt driven recession in our history. Talk about screwing future generations!!!!

The big question is; Has RWSA lost popular support? The next election may hold some clues.

@samuel, "...commercial, industrial, and residential building came to a jarring halt" Where have you been? They're starting a new hospital on W. Main Street. These past five years has shown a massive buildout at UVA.

Samuael,

I am sorry, but there is nothing bullying in the numbers, there are simply facts you don't want to accept. Whether or not we are in a recession, the population and the businesses in operation are what they currently are. And that is significantly larger than in 2001. Water consumption does not suddenyl drop because of a recession.

Personally I am not interested in funding more urban sprawl for developers. The collapse of Biscuit Run tells me that we really don't have a need for this infrastructure in the foreseable future, and there is no reason to pay for it.

Will someone explain why there is so much pressure to build the new dam at Ragged Mt., when all the facts show there are far better ways to supply water to the community by maintaining what we have ?

The lower cost of dredging has been know ever since the Hook reported this years ago, and all the water use data for a decade has shown that we are using less water and that people are just beginning to retrofit their homes to use even less. So commonsense tells us that water use will continue to decline.

Given all the facts and data against the need for 100's of millions of new infrastructure who is behind this plan ?

Why would our elected officials support this ?

@DAWG that isn't logical, because I have studied all the articles for years written in the Hook, and the data shows that just dredging will supply decades of water supply, and if one were to follow the unanimous decision by City Council ( before 3 members overturned it ) to add on to the existing Ragged Mt. Dam, you would have well over 4 decades of water supply for drought protection.

Why would developers want a more expensive solution that will make their costs higher, just look at what has happened to hook-up fees, which have driven the price of new construction higher.
And taking on increased rates to the ratepayers will make the cost of living higher, discouraging businesses from coming here.

I am still looking for the reason and haven't found it yet.

Could it be some supervisors pulled a fast one on everyone else? After all, the bypass won't be going over that new dam. Therefore, one major drawback to the bypass has been removed. Nah. They wouldn't be that sneaky, would they?

The link in my post above will show you the proximity of the Western ByPass to the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.

The link below includes a map showing you the proposed new Ragged Mt. Reservoir going under I64

http://readthehook.com/81847/cover-reservoir-dogged-142-million-boon...

Why no outcry from PEC and other environmentalists about this ?
Fellow detectives, please help me solve this puzzle.

Cookie Jar, I think you are right. It explains why both communities were in favor of it. You would think, as fond as they are of studies, though, that we would see one concerning the runoff from I-64 or the impact of a hazardous waste spill from it.

@samuel did you see this " All this is happening in a community where water customers have increased significantly over the past decade. The growth is most apparent in Albemarle, where hookups have increased by a third but-- thanks to the average customer trimming consumption from 135,000 to 89,000 gallons-- overall County usage has fallen by 14 percent."

How can you possibly defend destroying Ragged Mt. Natural Area , allowing South Fork Rivanna Reservoir to fill with silt, and raising water rates and hook-up fees, to pay for a dam and pipeline ( and pumps to get the water uphill - plus the cost of the electricity to do so ) when dredging gives us all the water we need for 4 decades and possibly much more, without the environmental destruction of our priceless resources.

Samuel who are you representing - certainly not the ratepayers .

@cookiejar-Trying to get a better understanding of what you mean.
Are you saying that since they anticipate under the current dam plan that the SFRR will silt in and become a marsh, that would allow more development in that area, or some sort of zoning change ?

NancyDrew, I'm thinking zoning or other regulatory change that might tunr a currently undevelopable plot or plots of land into developable land. That change resulting from an abandonment of the reservoir. I may be way off, but that's a thought that I keep coming back too. Without a good map of the proposed bypass to study, it's hard to know what property is affected or just how it might be affected.

Clearly, someone who has thought things out has an agenda or agendas and I suspect that there is some reason why both the dam and the bypass have been pushed so hard when neither is the best way solve the problem it supposedly is designed to solve. I just wonder if the two are connected in a way we aren't seeing the details of just yet.

People all over the country dredge reservoirs and other bodies of wate,r and that's what got me interested in this in the first place - why the war against dredging our reservoir ?

There must be something fishy behind this because dredging for water supply is so obviously the place to start.

$200,000+ dollars sounds like a lot to design a dredging RFP, but consider what RWSA has spent to date to design a new dam we don't need:

--Gannett Fleming's concrete dam design $ 2 million + ( then they were fired by RWSA ) , and now Schnabel's closing in on $2 million for their earthen dam design - and still no more water . In fact the earthen dam design gives us NO additional water supply for ratepayers during droughts. All new water from this new dam goes to rivers .

See letter below from ACSA board member Liz Palmer documenting that the new dam provides no additional water supply :

http://www.schillingshow.com/2011/04/23/all-wet-rwsa%E2%80%99s-25m-30-fo...

Maybe $200,000 sounds excessive to get it right and dredge for water supply, but this is peanuts compared to the millions they have spent designing a new dam that creates a reservoir that can't even fill itself without an uphill, electricity driven pipeline and pumps, whose engineering costs and land acquisition costs are just beginning to add up . And without which the new dam provides no new water

Anyone know how much they've spent to date designing the pipeline - my understanding is they paid a bundle just for an estimate and haven't even begun the design phase or land acquisition thru some of Albemarle's priciest neighborhoods ( that is unless the Western ByPass is built)

Wait till Frederick comes clean about what this pipeline, pumps, and electricity will cost, then you'll see some jaws drop .

@CityResident: "my understanding is they paid a bundle just for an estimate and haven't even begun the design phase or land acquisition thru some of Albemarle's priciest neighborhoods (THAT IS UNLESS THE WESTERN BYPASS IS BUILT)."

My emphasis added.

I'm not a conspiracy-minded person, but that is really where this whole thing starts to smell for me.

No bypass = no "free" easements on which to build a pipeline (powered by electricity from coal gained from blasting WVa mountains into a moonscape) to push water uphill from the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir to the clear-cut Ragged Mountain Reservoir.

In an ideal world, some of the really rich folks in our community would say: this has got to stop. I don't want my grandkids growing up in THAT kind of community, because it's anathema to my personal and civic values.

T,he most interesting thing about the new reservoir is that it isn't going to provide us with any additional water security against long-term drought. Having an in-stream reservoir, as we do now, means that even a modest rain following a dry period will typically fill the reservoir as all of the collected runoff from within the watershed minus mandatory streamflow discharges is impounded. In the future, when the SFRR has largely silted in and all of our stored water is pumped to Ragged Mt., a modest rain after a dry period will only provide us with the volume of water that can be pulled out of the river and pumped across town minus our normal daily usage, minus mandatory streamflow discharges (not only to maintain water levels in the Rivanna, but Moore's Creek as well). So what would today be a drought ending rain event will in the future just give us a few more days or perhaps a week of supply and we'll be much more dependent on experiencing consistent rainfall.

I heard Mr. Frederick, director of RWSA saying they put 3.5 million in the budget for dredging. What does this mean ? Is this dredging for water supply, or another trick to give cover to those who voted for the new dam and are up for re-election or running on a build the dam plan platform ?

There is no reason to build the new dam if we are going to dredge, as long as we dredge for water supply.

"No bypass = no "free" easements on which to build a pipeline " no one said that the State will provide a free easement to RWSA. It may wish to sell it or grant a long-term lease in order to to increase its budget for new roads elsewhere. VDOT is an agency governmed by politics. I think RWSA is hoping that the State will provide this largesse it cannot afford.
"Is this dredging for water supply..." all of the negotiations to date has deemed that any additional water storage capacity gained through dredging will not be added to the water storage total. Doesn't that sound crooked? Suppose dredging would have added 10 billion gallons of additional storage. That would still not be added to our water supply capacity and the same people would still advocate for building the same size dam. That says a lot about the people who are making the decisions around here.

Until I see a dredge in the water, I wouldn't believe a word they say about their " seriousness " about dredging. They have tried to derail, stall, and trick people into believing dredging was: too expensive, toxic, not feasible, noisy, smelly- you name it, I've heard every excuse in the book - and this is one more trick, say they're going to do it --and not have any money in the budget.

Let's elect some new people to City Council who we trust will finally do this . The old guard has had their chance to join Norris and Edwards and they failed.
from the CT link above:
" The Rivanna Water & Sewer Authority’s Board of Directors agreed Tuesday to prepare a $3.5 million budget for dredging at least a portion of the South Fork Rivanna Reservoir.

“[This] demonstrates that this board is serious about dredging,” said Maurice Jones, Charlottesville’s city manager, shortly before the board voted 6-0 on the matter. Gary O’Connell, executive director of the Albemarle County Service Authority, was absent.

James, do you have any idea why 3 city councilors voted for a plan that will destroy so many of the city's assets when the city needs no more water. In fact, the water the city owns at SFRReservoir will be lost under this plan, and then city ratepayers have to pay for part of the new dam to regain the water they have lost.
Why would any City Councilor support that ?

I don't believe for a minute that they are serious about dredging (not Brown, Huja, and Szakos) . And certainly not dredging to be part of the water plan instead of building a new dam, the only way to save city owned resources, and to save money.

Have you heard anything about their motives, and the motives of Beyer and Galvin, that would lead them to advocate for such a senseless plan for any of the ratepayers, but especially for city ratepayers ?