Beverly Water Department

GENERAL • Fiscal Year '09 marked the beginning of construction on the North Beverly Brook Drainage Improvements project. Approximately 400 feet of 48" reinforced concrete pipe was installed on Tozer Street. This 1,000 acre area in the city center is the final section requiring drainage enhancements.

• Design work continues on additional drainage improvements in the Chubbs Brook basin in Beverly Farms.

• The Environmental Impact Report for the Brimbal Avenue Interchange Project was completed and reviewed by both City officials and Mass Highway Department. It will now undergo a 12-month review by the Massachusetts Environmental Protection Agency before design work begins.

• During FY09, engineering firm Dewberry-Goodkind, Inc. of Boston began preliminary design for the Reconstruction of Route 1A from Memorial Bridge to Memorial Middle School. A Public Meeting on this project's progress, including the road reconfiguration at Gloucester Crossing, is scheduled for this Fall.

• Roads being reconstructed under the FY09 Chapter 90 Program include Clifton Avenue, Tremont Street, Longfellow Streets, and Whittier Avenue.

DAILY OPERATIONS • Geographic Information System - This past year we completed an update of the City's Water System. The GIS database has undergone Quality Assurance/Quality Control by Water Department staff and corrections have been made to the electronic database. Our GIS now reflects comprehensive information from drawings and staff knowledge.

• In June 2009 we launched a "New Look for the GIS Web Site" with assistance from consultant Applied Geographics. The site is now publicly accessible, allowing residents to create "Tax Maps" at their convenience. The new GIS site features additional layers including attractions, recreational features, trails, contours, natural resources, ward & precinct information with polling locations, plus aerial photography from 1947, 2002 and 2008.

• We maintain two password-protected subsites - one for City Personnel to create abutter data, and another with utilities information for Public Services and Engineering personnel. Public access to the GIS Web Site should reduce map requests to the Engineering Department.

• FEMA is creating new FIRM (Flood Insurance Rate Map) maps to replace those from 1986. The City has contributed to these maps by providing 2-foot contour GIS data, significantly improving accuracy compared to the 3-meter (9.9 foot) contour lines in MassGIS data. The new maps are in the "Comment Phase" for Essex County, with expected adoption in June/July 2010.

• The updated maps will reduce the number of Beverly buildings in flood zones, though some properties not currently in flood zones will be included when the new maps are adopted. FEMA is expected to issue a new Insurance Rate Schedule with the new maps; current FEMA Insurance holders will be grandfathered, while new applicants will follow the new rate schedule.

• The Engineering Department has continued using the Ricoh 2400 scanner acquired last year to digitize drawings and control files. Initial outsourcing estimates for this work were approximately $35,000, but by performing the work in-house with part-time assistance, we've spent only $9,500 and scanned over 6,000 plans with 5,000 records entered. We estimate that more than 50% of the work is complete and project total costs under $20,000.

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