Having suffered its third break in the past few months this week, the water main which feeds the Skead Road area is slated to be replaced this summer.
One cast iron water main serves the area and is “at the end of its useful life,” Linear Infrastructure Services director Joe Rocca told Sudbury.com.
“It’s kind of like a balancing act, at some point the asset isn’t as useful as it could be and it starts to fail more frequently, and that’s what we’ve started to see here,” he said.
Approximately 200 area residences were without water earlier this week when the water main broke, prompting Public Health Sudbury and Districts to issue a drinking water advisory urging people against drinking tap water until further notice.
Although Rocca said that repairs have been completed and water has been restored to the area, the drinking water advisory will remain in place until such time as the city has presented water samples to Public Health which meet their guidelines.
It’ll then be up to Public Health to give people the go-ahead to drink tap water again, Rocca said, noting that with the water main repaired, residents currently have water for such purposes as bathing and other purposes than drinking.
“Until bacteriological testing of the drinking water indicates a safe supply, the drinking water advisory will remain in effect as a precaution,” Public Health Sudbury and Districts noted in a media release issued on Thursday.
Prior water main breaks to affect these same residences occurred in the days surrounding New Year Day 2025 and early February, with Rocca noting that past years have also seen breaks.
The water main is part of the city’s 2025 capital program, which should go to tender in June and be completed this summer.
“We’re going to be building a new water main on the other side of the road and run services under the road to all the properties,” Rocca said.
After a mild 2023/24 winter season, Rocca said that the 2024/25 season has been more on par with the past years as it relates to cold weather hampering municipal infrastructure.
At this time of year, he said, “The ground tends to move a little bit more, we get a little bit of frost action so the pipes are more at risk during that period of time.”
More broadly, the city’s network of aging water mains are part of an overall annual infrastructure spending gap which staff estimated in late 2023 to be approximately $130 million. Water and Wastewater Services alone faced an estimated annual spending gap of $54.1 million.
These numbers are currently being updated, Rocca said.
Meanwhile, he said a report on the city’s latest long-term financial plan for municipal water/wastewater infrastructure is being prepared for city council discussion at the April 22 finance and administration committee meeting.
During this meeting, staff will make a recommendation on what water/wastewater rate increases should be. In recent years’ municipal budgets, these rates have gone up by a rate of 4.8-per cent annually.
Another recent notable water main break in Greater Sudbury took place on Feb. 26, when a break outside of Tom Davies Square (city hall) temporarily shut down the building’s operations.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.