With Phase II of the Southern Water Line down Federal Road completed, Brookfield’s commercial corridor has access to municipal water from the New Milford border to the intersection with Candlewood Lake Road. The town is now in the process of planning a third phase to extend the Southern Line an additional 980 feet to finish 50 feet shy of the Danbury border.
The final extension would service 15 Brookfield businesses and offer the potential to eventually connect with Danbury and further regionalize the area’s water supply.
“The main issue to Brookfield is there’s 15 properties that don’t have the water line,” Brookfield water consultant Martin Handshy said, explaining that the impetus to continue with the third phase came from the business owners.
If approved at a town meeting, the initial cost, estimated at approximately $500,000, would be bonded through the town but paid for by the property owners along the line through benefit assessments.
“This is an easy project for us to do,” First Selectman Bill Davidson said, stating that the intention is to “get this thing done and all the costs recorded by the end of August so that we can do a water benefit assessment for all three phases [of the Southern Line] collectively,” sending out the first bills by October.
That timeline is feasible, according to Handshy, who estimates construction time at no more than five to six weeks.
Once completed, Brookfield will also have the ability to connect to Danbury, giving the town an additional support system during an emergency situation.
“Connecting to Danbury increases the capability for volume in a water emergency,” Handshy explained, though Brookfield would not need to purchase water on a regular basis.
That would be important if the two systems were ever linked, according to Danbury Public Utilities Superintendent David Day, as the city has just enough water to meet state regulations, keeping reserves at 15 percent above daily average usage.
Both Handshy and Day also pointed out that a pump station would have to be built on the Brookfield side to pump uphill and a meter would have to be installed to measure flow between the two systems. Danbury would also have to extend their line from Stew Leonard’s to the Brookfield border, just south of KFC.
Regionalization is “something that’s always on our list,” Day said, and the city currently has an emergency hook ups for fire safety support with other towns, such as Bethel.
The idea has come up a number of times in his seven years with Danbury’s Public Utilities Department, he said, however he has not been involved in any recent discussions about connecting the Federal Road lines.
Those talks might be further down the road, according to Davidson, who said the line will likely terminate at KFC for now but that officials can begin discussions about what to do at the town line.
The Board of Selectmen (BOS) sent Phase III to the Planning Commission for an 8-24 referral Monday night and a resolution is expected to go to a town meeting in the next few months.
