The Airway Heights City Council at their Aug. 20 meeting approved a project to move water telemetry equipment from the restrooms in Sunset Park to another location and demolish the restroom building.
Telemetry equipment that gives the city’s public works department the ability to communicate with the city’s main water tank is located in the old restrooms in the park, which the parks and recreation department has wanted to demolish for some time, Public Works Director Kevin Anderson said.
“(The telemetry equipment) takes information about the water levels and transfers that to our headquarters and we’re able to make decisions based off of that information,” Anderson said.
The parks and recreation department is planning on getting some open space back in the park through the project.
“There’s really no need for the building except that the telemetry is on top of it,” Director J.C. Kennedy said.
The city has employed a telemetry consultant and engineer to come to some solutions for physically moving the equipment while keeping it in service the whole time, Anderson said.
“The hard part is that we have to have something temporary that will keep communication going while the equipment is being moved. Otherwise we’ll either run out of water or overflow the tank,” Anderson said.
The cost to pay the engineer is about $10,135 and was approved by the council at its most recent meeting. This is money budgeted in the water fund for telemetry modifications, but the council will have to approve future expenditures, Anderson said.
The telemetry equipment will be moved to a smaller structure about 100 feet away from the tank on the north end of Sunset Park. The city is hoping to have the project complete by the end of the year.
Shannen Talbot can be reached at [email protected].
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