Cameron Street Water Main Lining – Harrisburg, Dauphin County, PA

Capital Region Water (CRW) began operations in 1839, and the pipes along Cameron Street date back to the 1880s. These pipes had long outlived their expected service life, and water main breaks were becoming a frequent occurrence in recent years. HRG helped CRW determine the best method of rehabilitation and design a project that reduced costs and minimized disruption to customers.

CRW was interested in using Cured In Place Pipe lining (or CIPP lining) to rehabilitate these water mains in order to minimize concrete pavement restoration.  Cameron Street is a busy road in the heart of the state capital, and it’s a major connector to area attractions like the PA Farm Show Complex, UPMC Pinnacle, Harrisburg Area Community College, the Pennsylvania State Capitol Building, US-322, and I-81.  It’s also a state route, so a Highway Occupancy Permit would be required for the project.  Due to the concrete pavement in this section of Cameron Street, CRW would have to provide details of all the concrete pavement repairs in that permit application, and they’d need the location of each excavation pit to prepare them. Yet the high traffic volumes along Cameron Street made it impractical for a surveyor to go into the street and collect the existing concrete joint locations.  HRG used a truck-mounted mobile laser scanner to scan the roadway instead and collect the required features.  We used the information to locate access pits and minimize the number of concrete repairs.  This provided significant cost savings for CRW.

We also worked hard to maintain optimal service for CRW’s customers.  We asked our contractor to use CCTV equipment to record the location of all service connections before they lined the pipe.  After the CIPP was cured, a robot traveled inside the pipe with a CCTV camera, found the recorded locations, and drilled a hole inside the liner to reinstate the connections without digging up the road. Re-connection to the system was seamless for the customers and for CRW.

To maintain water service to customers – including the fire department – during construction, HRG developed a hydraulic model and designed a temporary water system to serve these customers.  In order to keep traffic flowing through this area and minimize roadway repairs, we designed the system to be built on both sides of the street.  Portions of the system had to be built above-ground, so we asked the contractor to be available at all times to protect the system from tampering.

So far, HRG has completed two phases of water main rehabilitation along Cameron Street, rehabilitating approximately 5,800 feet of pipeline from Maclay Street to State Street.  More than 100 years of use created significant deterioration in the existing pipe, so HRG determined that a structural-quality, Class IV lining was needed.  We designed the project to minimize pavement restoration requirements and reduce costs for CRW. We also used technology to minimize disruption to CRW’s customers and the thousands of drivers that travel through this area every day.  Thanks to the success of these first two phases, CRW has contracted with HRG to design a third phase of water main rehabilitation.

Read more about this project in this feature from Water & Wastes Digest