Navigating a treasure trove of historical water service records dating back 140 years
As our water client for more than 70 years, the Town of Norwood knew exactly where to look for help when news of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) imminent Lead and Copper Rule Revisions (LCRR) broke. Having an in-depth knowledge of the town’s water distribution system, we were eager to help.
Experienced with the complexities of navigating and researching water service historical records, we understand how quality, cost, and applicability relates to the LCRR. Working closely with the Town, we established a phased water service inventory development program that prioritized cost-effective methods to determine service materials and avoid expensive field investigation methods. This approach offered attainable project costs that also included successfully obtaining Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) grant monies for communities planning to identify and replace lead service lines (LSL).
We found long-forgotten records and Town reports dating back to the late 1880s that painted a vivid picture of unique, diverse, and unexpected service line material installations. We also used many other, newer batches of data to create custom relationships and rules between records and prioritized data and interpreted record value to transform into an EPA-friendly inventory template.
As a result, the Town of Norwood has a plan to find and ultimately remove lead from their water system.
At a Glance
- Offices
- Client
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- Town of Norwood, Massachusetts
- Partners
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- Massachusetts Department of
- Environmental Protection (MassDEP)
- Massachusetts Clean Water Trust
Nick Bouthilette, Associate, Engineering Discipline Lead – Water Conveyance (US Northeast)
Quality and attention to detail are essential—it drives our repeat business, reputation, and risk reduction.
Allison Shull, Data Scientist
Math isn’t gameable, and it’s best to lean into the rigidity of that challenge.
Lance Price, Data Scientist
I love my job, the variety of skillsets, perspectives, and characters that I can learn from and different types of data to “play” with.
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