Politics & Government

Rye Sluice Gate Contractors Selected

Rye City Council selected firms to provide environmental studies related to the Bowman Avenue flood project and to fabricate the sluice gate mechanism.

Wednesday night the Rye City Council will vote to authorize city manager Scott Pickup to negotiate with FPM Group, Ltd to provide hydrology reports and other "environmental engineering services" at a 15-acre park development site in the Town of Harrison called Project Home Run. The firm submitted a bid of $112,000 to perform the study, according to Mayor Doug French who also included details in his most recent city update. The Council also approved ELQ Industries of New Rochelle to work on the fabrication of the sluice gate mechanism.

The City of Rye and Village of Rye Brook were in negotiations last fall to complete intermunicipal agreements that would have allowed construction of the flood retention project to commence in 2011. The sluice gate is intended to lessen the flow of the Blind Brook and create additional storage capacity at the Bowman Avenue location.

The Village of Rye Brook completed a flood mitigation study on the project in 2008. The Bowman Avenue project has been somewhat bogged in a bureaucratic morass: it will be located on land owned by the City of Rye and maintained by the Village of Rye Brook. A joint grant to Rye and Rye Brook will funding the project, including fabrication of the actual flood gate mechanism and its future maintenance. The final cost was estimated at approximately $970,000.

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During negotiations last fall between the City of Rye and Village of Rye Brook to complete inter-municipal agreements regarding the fabrication and maintenance of the Bowman Avenue Sluice gate, the Town of Harrison asserted last November they should also be included in the formal approval process. 

At that time, Harrison Mayor/Supervisor Joan Walsh argued that since the brook runs along the border of Harrison and Rye, the municipality should be included in the process. The FPM study would provide an environmental analysis, specifically on the flooding impact of the sluice gate project, at the Harrison park site.

Find out what's happening in Ryewith free, real-time updates from Patch.


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