Macomb County issued the following announcement on Aug. 27.
The Macomb County Public Works Office has begun emergency repairs on sinkholes in Eastpointe and Fraser.
In Eastpointe, a void under a sidewalk in front of Eastpointe Middle School on Kelly Road was discovered in the preparations for the first day of school. A void as much as 8 feet deep formed under a stretch of the sidewalk near a manhole on a lateral of the Stephens Relief Drain, a large storm drain that services Eastpointe and St. Clair Shores, running east-west and emptying directly into to Lake St. Clair. No roadway is impacted and the sidewalk area was cordoned off. An engineering team was on site today, Aug. 27, to begin the repair process.
In Fraser, repairs are underway on the Priest Drain, a storm sewer that services that community. The sinkhole is on Kingston Street, a residential street south of 14 Mile Road and west of Utica Road. The sinkhole was about 8 feet in diameter. The pipe is about 10 feet below the surface of the street. Part of Kingston Street is closed during the repair process.
“Our underground infrastructure is aging in place. This is why we are actively working to inspect it and to work on preventative maintenance. In both places, our partners in the Eastpointe and Fraser departments of public works worked with us to identify these problems. We find em. We fix em,” said Macomb County Public Works Commissioner Candice S. Miller. “We are particularly thankful that the sinkhole near the Eastpointe Middle School was identified before the first day of school so no students were injured.”
The separate repairs are each expected to take about two weeks to complete. The combined total costs, which will be paid for from separate funds from the two drains, is expected to be below $50,000.
“Simply put, this kind of repair work is more expensive than paying for an ounce of prevention, which is another reason we are working so diligently to thoroughly inspect all 475 storm drains in Macomb County,” Miller said.
Original source can be found here.
Source: Macomb County
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