Wimberley Mayor Gina Fulkerson (center) stands in front of the lift station as it is being installed along with City Administrator Shawn Cox, Project Manager Craig Fore, Capital Excavation General Superintendent Joe Mayfield and the rest of the Capital Ex
Top: The massive lift station almost made the construction equipment that was on hand to install it look small. All of 33-feet in length, the lift station would be installed vertically, and will almost entirely be underground. PHOTO BY DALTON SWEAT/WIMBER
Bottom Left: A crane was used to stand the equipment up. The location is next to the intersection of FM 3237 and Ranch Road 12 (the stoplight can be seen in the back of the photo.) PHOTO BY DALTON SWEAT/WIMBERLEY VIEW
Bottom Right: The hole the lift station was dropped into was only a few feet larger than the diameter of the cylinder. The bottom of the hole also had to be level so that the lift station would be level once it settled into its final location. The top of
33-foot deep lift station installed
A milestone project for the Wimberley sewer system was completed last week as the 33-foot long, six-foot diameter lift station was placed vertically into the ground.
“We took a big step in getting one of the biggest parts of the project installed in the lift station,” Craig Fore, project manager for the city of Wimberley’s sewer system, said. “That is the heart and soul of this whole thing. Getting that in place is a big deal.”
A crane lifted the 3,500-pound fiberglass lift station and placed it in a hole near the intersection of FM 3237 and Ranch Road 12, which is the lowest point in the sewer system. From there, sewage will be pumped to the Aqua Texas lift station near H-E-B.
Joe Mayfield, general superintendent for Capital Excavation, said that the company is about 90 percent done with the current contract. A sewer line on FM 3237 and on Oldham Lane still needs to be placed along with roadwork and repair in the general area of the sewer system. Mayfield said that portion of the project should be completed by mid-September.
The next part of the project, which is the line that will cross the bridge at Cypress Creek and connect to the lift station at H-E-B, still needs to be approved and bid before construction can begin.
“The bridge crossing has been approved by TxDOT, and we are hoping this week to get word on the rest of the project from the bridge to H-E-B,” Wimberley Mayor Gina Fulkerson said. “The plans are complete and have been submitted to TxDOT. I think they have asked some clarifying questions, but we don’t see anything that shouldn’t go through. It’s just the bureaucracy part of it goes slower than you want some times. As soon as that is done, that portion of the project will have to go to bid again. By law, since that is an addition above and beyond a certain percentage of the original contract, it has to be bid separately. We are already getting the bid documents together, so as soon as we get the plan’s final ‘OK’ from TxDOT we are ready to go with that.”