CORNELIA – After years of planning, the Cornelia City Commission is moving ahead with construction of a new water treatment plant and reservoir.
“We finally, after seven years of planning and engineering, have awarded a contract for the construction of our new 4-MGD water plant and 75-million-gallon raw water reservoir,” said City Manager Donald Anderson. “The contract goes to a company called Heavy Constructors for the amount of $20,555,000 and we’re hoping to break ground about the middle of May.”
Anderson said the contract term to construct the four-million-gallon-per-day water treatment plant and the new reservoir off Camp Creek Road is 24 months.
The $20.55-million bid is $2.1 million more than the original 2010 budget. The Georgia Environmental Finance Authority will approve the city’s request for up to $3 million added to the city’s loans at the 1.4-percent rate of the original loans.
The low bid is 3.39 percent lower than the next bid and 8.39 percent lower than the highest of the five bids received for construction of the plant and reservoir.
Asked how the new lake will differ from the current one, which is bounded by Wilson Road, Camp Creek Road and Lakeview Heights Circle, Anderson said, “We get a little more water storage, but the footprint will be smaller than the existing reservoir because it will be skinnier and deeper. But the biggest thing for us, if anybody has witnessed our attempt to dredge the existing reservoir over the last year, is the new reservoir will have a liner, which will make it easier for maintenance purposes.”
Having two reservoirs in the future will allow the city to take one offline without service interruption, Anderson said.
“We’re very excited to get this started,” Anderson said.
