By the end of this month, the Water and Sewerage (W&S) Corporation should have completed the installation of water mains in eastern New Providence at the cost of $2.1 million to tackle two areas of concern for the Corporation.

Minister of State for the Environment the Hon. Phenton Neymour said the first of these concerns is ‘non-revenue water’ – water either lost due to leaks or unaccounted for and is not billed.

The other concern is “rusty water” or “poor quality water in regards to aesthetics”, Mr. Neymour explained during a walk-about at the junction of Eastern Road and San Souci, Wednesday, October 8.

He said the works being undertaken will address these issues from Winton to Fox Hill road and From Fox Hill road down to Farrington Road.

Workers from the Corporation are installing 10-inch water mains on the Eastern Road and the Minister of State said, “We have already installed a mile and a half of 8-inch water mains along Fox Hill Road with the view of eliminating rusty water.

“We are also completing the side corners off of the Eastern Road and Fox Hill at the same time.”

Mr. Neymour explained that an additional reason for installing the water mains was to improve customer service.

“Late last year, we received a number of complaints from the residents from the Eastern Road and the Fox Hill areas complaining about rusty water,” he said. “So we felt that it was critical due to the magnitude of the complaints that we quickly respond to their complaints.

Mr. Neymour added, “The W&S Corporation acknowledges that the Eastern Road is highly travelled; so we begin the work after the main traffic has left, and we complete these works today around 2:30 p.m. before the school closes so we minimise the traffic interruptions.”

The Minister of State also explained that residents should not fear the condition of the roads when the work is completed.

“We had challenges a few months ago in regards to reinstatement due to the low ability of asphalt to reinstate the roads, he said. ”Since then we have put our work crews and contractors to reinstate the roads and at one point, we had doubled the amount of contractors on this job.

“If we find the road quality to be poor after we have reinstated it, then we will come by and pave it over again.”