New stormwater pipes will benefit Freeland

"People driving through Freeland this week saw something happening on Main Street that might be rarer than a blue moon -- actual utility work.The most concentrated business center on South Whidbey, downtown Freeland, is getting a big addition to its small stormwater system thanks to a new senior housing project currently under construction at the town's far eastern edge.An Island Construction crew spent the week digging a trench down Main Street and filled it with a 20-inch PVC plastic sewer pipe. Erl Bangston, one of the developers building the senior housing project, said the $500,000 in storm sewer work he and Langley's HMH Management are doing will handle 80 percent of the runoff from the development.It will take care of a lot of water, Bangston said.The work will go beyond Main Street. Next week, Island Construction will run the new line down East Harbor Road towards Freeland's storm sewer outfall. Bangston and HMH will also have to pay for improvements to the outfall because of the amount of water their development will send through it. Originally, the developers had hoped a wetland on the development property would be able to handle the runoff. The county planning department disagreed, making the new sewer line necessary.It was one of those no option things, Bangston said.The new line will tie in with the existing storm sewer, thus will wind up carrying storm runoff for the entire town. It will not carry any sanitary sewer effluent. The senior housing project will have its own, on-site sewage treatment system.Bangston's and HMH's project will include 41 condominiums and a 78-unit assisted-living facility. The expected completion date is late 2001. "

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