Crumbled Infrastructure Uncovered After Four Years
A city commissioner reveals that a $17,000 sewer project installed four years ago was completed without cement in the pipe joints, necessitating a costly overhaul.
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Commissioner McGregor has discovered a botched sewer job put in four years ago, which will probably have to be almost entirely done over. Contractor A. M. Moore he says was the contractor and P. J. Sweeney the inspector who officiated on the job for the installation of the sewer job connecting up Wright avenue and X street for which $17,000 was paid. The commissioner says no cement was used in the pipe joints and as a result the sewer leaks and is pushing out of place and making all sorts of trouble. He will report the condition to the council tonight. Owing to the lapse of time it is feared nothing can be done with the contractor on the job.
“The commissioner says no cement was used in the pipe joints and as a result the sewer leaks and is pushing out of place and making all sorts of trouble.”
Stories of shoddy infrastructure and lack of oversight in municipal contracting are timeless, but the scale of the waste—$17,000 in 1909—illustrates the high stakes of public works maintenance in a growing city.
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