Volume Discount Some Assembly Required As Town Receives A Much-Needed Water Tank

The first high-rise in Athol is finally under construction.

A 250,000-gallon water tank arrived in pieces Thursday aboard a flatbed tractor trailer from its former home at a Ford Motor Co. plant in Detroit.

Workers from Kentucky started welding the quarter-inch steel walls together Thursday afternoon. After being unloaded by a crane, the pieces were strewn about the site like fragments of a big, peach eggshell.

“It’s just a big jigsaw puzzle,” said councilman Bob Rickel, who’s been working on the water expansion project since he joined the council two years ago.

The new tank will keep the city’s taps from running dry, boost water pressure and increase volume to accommodate residential growth.

The cylindrical tank could be welded together within the next two weeks. It will rise almost 100 feet above Athol on six legs.

The tank is the final phase of a project to expand Athol’s water system, boost water pressure and add capacity. The city currently has 75,000 gallons of storage capacity on the west side of town.

The new tank is going up across the street from Athol Elementary School in a growing section of town. When the school district added classrooms to the elementary school last year, the state fire marshal allowed the additions on the city’s promise that it would upgrade its water system.

In the summer of 1994, the city taps ran dry when the school construction workers flushed out the new water pipes for the school.

In August 1994, the city was one of 24 Idaho communities that won approval for a state Community Development Block Grant for its water system. The city had requested $330,100 for the project.

The grant, along with a $70,000 bond issue city residents approved last spring, city reserves and water capitalization fees, all contributed to the $667,000 project.

Four-thousand feet of new piping has been installed.

“That pipe sticking out of the ground is the end of it,” Johnson said pointing to a rusting 10-inch pipe standing amid the water-tower parts.

Johnson said that by purchasing a used water tank through the contractor, Pittsburgh Tank and Tower, the city saved a considerable amount of money. A new water tower the same size would cost approximately $1 million.

The tank parts arrived a few days later than expected because of stormy conditions in the Midwest, said truck driver Bill Fuwell.

“I was shut down just as I got into Iowa” because of whiteout conditions, he said.

Because he carried a wide load, Fuwell couldn’t drive at night. When he crossed Lookout Pass Thursday morning, he stopped to help a family whose car rolled off the highway.

When he arrived in Athol, the five Tank and Tower workers were ready with a crane and generators for their welding equipment. Although the tank may be erected within a month, it won’t go on line until spring.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: WHAT IT COST The used tank cost $667,000. A new water tower would be approximately $1 million.