DEC drops objections to stream adjustment
The Shephard’s Road bridge in Fenner, heavily damaged by the July 1 storm, was fixed last week and, while the fix is temporary with major work to occur next year, the cost will be far less than originally anticipated. This is because the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) backed off its original demand that the town realign the bridge to the new course of the stream underneath it — a course changed by the storm.
The stream — a part of Chittenango Creek — ran in a straight line through two culverts that ran under Shephard’s Road. The force of the storm shifted the stream about five feet, and changed it into an “S” shape.
When Fenner Highway Superintendent Dan Smith told the DEC he wanted to simply take an excavator to the stream — currently running about an inch deep — and realign it to how it was before the storm, state officials told him he could not.
“Shephard’s Road according to [the DEC] is a ‘navigable stream,’ and that’s why we can’t fix it … it’s frustrating,” said Fenner Town Supervisor David Jones in August. “You couldn’t navigate a frog in a rowboat down there now.”
By not being allowed to realign the stream, the town would have been forced to realign the culverts under the bridge to match the altered stream, which was estimated to cost more than $100,000 as part of the overall bridge repair.
“I explained to the DEC that all the water was going into one pipe [rather than two] … and after further discussion they allowed me to return the stream to its original condition before the storm,” Smith said. “We rented an excavator and opened it up; both pipes are open and running as well as ever.”
In addition to realigning the stream last week, Smith and the town highway crew also repaired the roadway on the bridge, which was partially washed away during the storm, causing the town to close the road. The work was done last Monday and Tuesday, and was completed and the road reopened in time for the start of school and school buses that use the road.
The work cost about $3,500, Smith said, but it is only a temporary fix until next year when the bridge and culverts will be completely redone. That work will probably be bid out to contractors, and will be funded through federal storm recovery money, Smith said.
