Archive: News

For some time Village of Lansing Trustees have been talking about expanding their campus by removing a 500,000 gallon water tank just above the Village Office, east of Oakcrest Road.  But removing the tank has been delayed by Southern Cayuga Lake (Bolton Point ) Intermunicipal Water Commission plans to paint a 1.5 welded steel tank on Horizon Drive just east of Burdick Hill Road.  Now the Village and Bolton Point are planning to build a new 900,000 gallon tank that may mean the Village Office tank will be removed by next summer.  "This tank will be replaced by a fraction of the new tank," says Mayor Donald Hartill.  "We already have in place most of the infrastructure that we need to be able to do that."

All the water for the Towns of Lansing, Ithaca (not including the city), and Dryden, and Villages of Lansing and Cayuga Heights is pumped from Cayuga Lake to the Burdick Hill tank.  That tank, in turn, feeds 21 other tanks that deliver water to customers throughout the five municipalities.  A pump station on the property pumps water to the Village Circle and Bean Hill tanks in the Town of Lansing, providing the town with its primary water supply.  A pump station attached to the Village Office pumps water from the Burdick Hill tank to the six base tanks and the three million gallon East Hill tank.  Currently the Oakcrest tank and another at the airport are located in the Village of Lansing.


But the 60 year old concrete Oakcrest tank is beginning to fail.  Water is seeping through the concrete, and only a fraction of its capacity is needed to serve the areas along Triphammer and Oakcrest Roads that it serves in the Village.  "The Village wants to get rid of that tank," says Bolton Point General Manager Paul Tunison.  "The commission needs to build this new tank regardless, but the Village is willing to contribute if they can then use that tank to replace their existing tank at the Village Office site.  The plan is, once the new tank is constructed that tank will then supply all the customers that are currently served by the tank at the Village Office."

The new tank is needed because of a long overdue plan to paint interior of the Burdick Hill tank, which feeds all the other tanks in the system including the 3 million gallon East Hill tank that was built three years ago.  "We operate the plant during the week from midnight to 5 in the afternoon," Tunison explains.  "By 5 in the afternoon that tank is full, and then from 5 to midnight all the rest of the system is kept full with water from that tank.  So it gradually drops down to about 15 feet by the time midnight comes around.  Then the operator starts the plant, and during the course of the night and the following day it's filled  back up again."

The new tank will be located right next to that main one, replacing the 32 year old welded steel tank during the two months or so needed to paint it.  The interior will be painted white, and Tunison says that town officials will probably be given the option to choose the exterior color.  Once the painting is completed the new tank will work in tandem with the old one, adding almost a million gallons of capacity to the system.  "It's ideal because the Commission already owns the property," Tunison  says.  "It's right next to this tank.  We've known for a long time that eventually this tank was going to have to be painted."

While that tank is being painted, though, the capacity will be reduced as the entire system is fed by the smaller new one.  Tunison says the system can easily handle that.  "During the time period that it takes to recoat the interior and exterior of the existing tank we will have to extend our operating hours by a few hours a day to get us through that period," he says.  "But that's not a big deal."

He adds that as soon as the new tank comes on-line the Village can take down its old tank.


Getting that tank removed is less urgent than it was a year or so ago when the Village proposed locating a new fire station on the site.  But this year Lansing fire commissioners backed off a plan to build the new firehouse because costs had spiraled way beyond what they were willing to spend.  The fire district is now considering a smaller firehouse to replace the Oakcrest Road station, which is inadequate for modern fire fighting equipment.  But a new firehouse could be years away.

Meanwhile the Village has expanded its services, adding a new public works employee this year.  Removal of the tank will free up significant space in the area behind the Village Office where road equipment and supplies are stored.

Building a new tank was only one solution considered by Bolton Point.  Using the failing Oakcrest tank was one option, and running a second pump station was considered.  "The third option to try to run the two pump stations next to each other was a disaster waiting to happen," says Village Engineer Dave Putnam.

Hartill says that using the Oakcrest tank would have been a costly and unstable solution.  "That solution was to use this tank as a live buffer," he says.  "There is some risk to its integrity and a fairly large investment on the Village's part do the valving and overflow protection and all of that."

The new tank will be erected by Natgun, a Massachusetts based company that erects concrete tanks nationwide.  Tunison says the technology has improved considerably since the Oakcrest tank was built, and that new tanks last 100 years with no maintenance.  The tank will be located next to the Burdick Hill tank, and in order to work in tandem it must be at the same elevation and be the same height as the old one.  "It needs to be a specific height," Putnam says.  "They both have domed tops.  One of the domes may be higher than the other.  It is pre-cast, erected on-site.  They build a form and they just keep building another on top of another on top of another, five or six high."


Bolton Point officials originally hoped to build the new tank during the current construction season.  But getting approvals from the Town Planning Board, the water commission, and all five individual municipalities will take more time.  "With all the procedures that have to be gone through it is getting too late in the year to have all the Ts crossed and the Is dotted," Tunison says.  "The Commission also has to borrow to construct this tank.  It has to obtain a serial bond.  That's a drawn out process, because not only does the Commission have to approve the project for the tank and go out and borrow for it, but each of the five municipalities individually have to approve the project and the funding."

Tunison notes that the engineering for the project has begun, and he hopes the bidding will be completed in the coming winter so that construction can begin in the Spring.  "We're hoping we can start construction in April.  "That will still give us a big enough window in next year's construction season to also repaint the Burdick Hill tank," he says.  "It's just something that has to happen now," Tunison says.  "This tank really needs to be recoated and we can't do it unless we have another tank there.  It's just not possible."

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