City lifts water restrictions early as no water main break found

Ruby Pratka, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

editor@qctonline.com

Water restrictions put in place over a large swath of Quebec City and L’Ancienne-Lorette due to a suspected water main break in the Les Rivières borough have been lifted, city officials confirmed on June 29.

A temporary ban on using drinking water to water lawns and driveways and fill swimming pools is no longer in effect, and residents can go back to washing dishes and doing laundry with tap water as normal. Restrictions were first imposed on June 26 and were expected to last until July 5 and perhaps beyond that, but city officials lifted the restrictions earlier than expected after it was confirmed that the pipe was not broken after all. Tests indicated that the leak was coming from a smaller, decommissioned drainage pipe.

“The scenario that we feared the most – a break in a 42-inch water main – has now been taken off the table,” Mayor Bruno Marchand announced on June 28. “In the last few hours, we have been able to get water flowing again through the pipe concerned. We will gradually bring it back into service and continue to monitor it and to monitor water quality. … It is with relief that we are lifting the restrictions on the use of drinking water six days earlier than the deadline initially planned.” He praised city employees who put in 16-hour days to monitor the leak and conduct needed repairs. “The success and speed of execution of the work are attributable not only to our teams but also to the contribution of citizens. I would like to thank them once again for their efforts, which have made a real difference.”

Patrick Bastien, director of the Les Rivières borough, explained that city staff had conducted exploratory digs near the site of the leak once the giant pipe had been emptied, and those digs continued to turn up water. Bastien said excavations suggested the leak had been coming from a pipe put in place to drain construction trenches when the water main was being built in the early 1950s. “We followed that pipe 600 metres north to a small marsh, and with dye tests, we managed to make a link between the leak and the water in that pipe. That’s not to say this is the only cause … there could be several sources, but we blocked that drainage pipe and there was no further water leaking.” Bastien said tests indicated that the 42- inch pipe was “still in very good shape” and that it would be progressively put back into service. The damaged drainage pipe is no longer needed, and workers are blocking it, Bastien said.

Marchand thanked residents for respecting the water restrictions, which brought water consumption down by 20 per cent and allowed the city to keep water flowing while the damaged pipe was out of service. He added that the city had received a “solidarity message” from Calgary mayor Jyoti Gondek, who is dealing with the sort of worst-case scenario that Quebec City officials feared – a “catastrophic break” in the feeder main pumping water from one of the region’s largest water treatment plants into Calgary’s water supply; the repaired water main is expected to be gradually brought back into service over the first week of July, ending a month of water restrictions.