It's somewhat easy to forget about the Pacific Palisades and Altadena fires and all the others that preceded it in California when we are personally unaffected. It was only four months ago, but it caused me to wonder about how well B'game is set up to deal with something like that? There is a lot of fuel in Mills Canyon and there is at least one large 50-acre tract in Hillsborough that could foreseeably be a starting point. And if the wind were blowing just so.....
It's one thing to assess our resilience to a long-term drought which I did here after reading the City Urban Water Management Plan. That's for drinking, showering, cooking and irrigation. It's something entirely different to consider a conflagration response. The B'game Water Department was kind enough to accommodate my curiosity with a two-hour field tour of our water system. I had some basic understanding from the UWMP, but seeing the network of feeder pipes, distribution pipes, pumps, pressure regulators, tanks, reservoirs, generators and SCADA monitoring was enlightening. Major pieces of the system are all around us. One just might not realize it until pointed out.
Three major pipes bring us the SFPUC feed. They are about a block apart running north-south through the city in the flat lands near ECR. There are six pumping stations, seven water storage tanks (above ground like the one shown below on Rivera) and reservoirs (below grade) that feed ten pressure zones. The history of the system closely tracks the history of the city since development moved up the hill and city water followed along replacing wells. Hence the need for pump--big pumps. The top-most reservoir is on the west side of Skyline Blvd.
Unlike the LA fire when the Santa Ynez Reservoir, with a capacity of 117 million gallons, was out of service due to repairs needed on its cover, ours are more distributed and have some back-up capability. I have a lot of confidence that our staff can move water around to the best of the system's design capability. The question is "would it be enough" if we had a fast-moving multi-acre fire? My best guess--and it's my guess--not any input or comments from staff, is probably not. If Central County Fire rolled three or four trucks and all tapped into nearby hydrants, the system would likely struggle to supply them for very long. Again, that's my layman's guess.
Furthermore, what could we do about it in the absence of a gusher of new money? There's no appetite for higher water rates that are already in an uphill trend. And even if there were, the design improvements are far from obvious. Some of B'game might be ripe for the Zone 0 five-foot vegetation clearance requirement and they probably know who they are. You can look here for the official risk map. In the meantime, let's hope the state figures out a middle ground on insurance and we get lucky. At least it appears the Hetch Hetchy is about 90% full. Here's one place where we keep our portion.
The money will keep flowing into the water system according to this DJ article today:
A planned $9.9 million transfer to the capital improvement fund — which will focus on the city’s potable water system and sanitary sewers this year — plus more than $3 million for debt services, will leave Burlingame at a $2.7 million net operating deficit.
Posted by: Joe | May 28, 2025 at 04:32 PM
Bottom of this article notes how the purchase of a $35 million dollar city hall might cause a problem with city finances.
How about staying put for awhile?
Posted by: Spurinna | May 28, 2025 at 05:58 PM
This is what constant monitoring and testing is all about. From the Merc:
A notice for residents to boil their tap water before using is immediately in effect until Sunday for those living near the Cupertino-Saratoga border, according to San Jose Water.
The advisory was prompted by a sudden loss of water pressure caused by nearby construction activity, the company said in a statement. Residents are advised to use bottled water, or boil tap water for at least one minute before using it for drinking, cooking or brushing their teeth.
The full list of affected streets are listed on the company’s website.
Boil water alerts are issued when there is a decrease in pressure of one of the main water pipes. The incident can be caused by events like breaks, power outages, or maintenance activities.
Drops in water pressure can sometimes allow pollutants to seep into the water supply. Boiling water can kill any potential harmful organisms that might have made their way into the drinking water, the company states.
Posted by: Joe | June 13, 2025 at 04:51 PM