Residents of a community adjacent to Huu-ay-aht First Nations’ Anacla are thrilled a major submarine watermain project is now complete.
Officials from the Alberni-Clayoquot Regional District (ACRD) held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Mar. 6 to celebrate its new $1.2 million project, which saw the construction of submarine line replacement.
The new line will provide a more reliable source of potable water for the community of West Bamfield. It replaces a line which had existed since 1981 and had its share of challenges in recent years including leaks and a boil water advisory last June.
The ACRD had contributed more than $300,000 in funding for the project. The federal government chipped in with about $470,000 while the British Columbia government provided close to $400,000.
Eddie Kunderman, the ACRD’s operations manager, said the completion of the line is a relief for West Bamfield residents.
“The other line had a number of failed welds along it that were repaired,” he said. “But it was always kind of one of those things and hoping it would hold for longer. It was aging infrastructure installed around 1980. It had reached its end of life and our water operators had done a fantastic job, keeping it going and with all the repairs. So yeah, it's just a little bit of a peace of mind for those on the west side.”
Kunderman is hoping the new line will be problem free for several decades. “Anytime you talk about infrastructure, there are always things that could take place, especially submarine infrastructure,” he said. “It adds a whole other layer of complexity to things. But we feel good about the process that was undertaken and the line of where it is right now.”
Officials had previously hoped that the new line would be completed by June of 2025.
“I had hoped that it would have been done in June, just to avoid the risk of some form of failure, impacting our summer shoulder season,” said Bob Beckett, the ACRD director for electoral area “A” Bamfield.
“But it didn't align. There's lots of challenges with the permitting process, especially with department of fisheries and those type of governing bodies. But the good news is that we got all the permissions and the work was just recently completed.”
Beckett also said work on the line was not possible to do last summer because of boat traffic in the harbour.
“It was a quite an engineering feat to float the line in and then sink it in,” he said. “It had to be strategically located.”
Beckett added it wasn’t simply placing a matter of placing the pipe in a straight line as it had to be situated at several different angles.
“The bottom of the harbour, of course, is not level,” he said. And it has different depths and so they had to maneuver it around certain obstructions and keep it at a certain depth. It's now in place.
“It's properly anchored so that it can't be damaged by vessels or people anchoring over top of it as well. It’s marked on the surface with buoys. Hopefully it will last for a long, long time.”
Beckett said he’s pleased the piping did not create any additional problems after its last leak and boil water advisory last June. He’s thankful the new project is now finished as he felt it was just a matter of time before another failure would occur with the old pipe.
“Tourism is huge for our community, especially June, July, August and September,” he added. “Most of the accommodations for the tourism is on the west side, which this line feeds. If the business has lost the potable water, it would have a very negative effect on one's experience at a lodge or at a cottage.
“We were able to get past our shoulder season last year and I'm just so glad that we don't have to worry about it with this upcoming tourism season.”
Beckett also said the newly installed pipe is considerably better than its predecessor.
“It's a very large pipe,” he said adding it is 300 millimetres wide. “We've doubled the size of the pipe which will allow for better flow, better pressure, better fire flows and will help with whatever growth the west side may see in the years to come.”
And it’s also better in other aspects. “It's a continual welded, I'll call it plastic but it's synthetic material, whereas the other pipe had couplings in it and they were prone to failure,” Beckett said. “This is a very, very rugged line. There will be no corrosion. There are no couplings that should fail. It should last a considerable amount of time.”
Kunderman also spoke highly of the new project. “When we talk about the pressure rating of the line, it's improved,” he said. “When you look at all the technologies in the world, when they're from the 1980s compared to 2025-2026, technology has improved. So, the robustness of the line is something we feel more confident about now. The outer wall of the line is much thicker. We feel good about it.”