Community Corner

Final Repairs on Buckingham Village Retention Basin Get Under Way

By September, the township expects repairs on the basin to be complete and future maintenance responsibility turned over to property owners.

If the summer's dry weather continues, the Buckingham Village retention basin could be repaired and its as early as September.

The township has engaged the New Haven-based Pamar Enterprises to complete the final repairs for an estimated cost of $242,310.

This cost will be added to the almost $150,000 the township has already spent on engineering studies, legal work and preliminary repairs.

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James Van Tiflin, project manager of the township’s engineering consulting firm Spalding DeDecker Associations, Inc., said he expects the final cost of the basin's rehabilitation will be higher than the $318,000 estimate made in March.

Pamar Enterprises is prepared to begin construction as soon as possible. Once repairs are completed, the township will transfer responsibility of the basin's maintenance to Buckingham Village and Wingate property owners.

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"The township's responsibility is going to be to fix the basin and then give (property owners) the information they are going to need to maintain it," Van Tiflin said.

He added that he has been in contact with Buckingham Village residents and is working with them to ensure they have all the information required to take control of the basin's maintenance when the township steps out in September.

"We don't want to just one day turn it over and have no one standing there," he said. "We're going to provide them the plans and all the information we have that can maintain it."

Final repairs will include removing the dirt which has accumulated at the bottom of the basin and lining the bottom with landscape fabric and large rocks to hold other materials back, rehabilitating the outlet structure (how water gets from the basin to the pump station), and replacing broken sections of the surrounding fence. 

The basin’s original builder, GTR Builders, filed bankruptcy months ago, and although the township filed a claim for the cost incurred and future costs to repair the retention basin, no restitution is expected.


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