CROTHERSVILLE

It all started with a hole in the ground.

Then when a storm sewer line in the Marathon gas station’s parking lot in Crothersville was filled with concrete to fix the sinkhole, it created more issues.

After several years of trying to get the property owner, LLB Food Mart LLC, to agree to pay nearly $30,000 to fix the sinkhole, Crothersville officials still have yet to receive a response.

Also contributing to the delay in fixing the issue is receiving approval from the Indiana Department of Transportation since the line is in its right of way along U.S. 31 or Armstrong St. A permit has to be granted before a contractor can begin work.

During a recent meeting, the Crothersville Town Council approved a quote of $39,720 from King’s Trucking and Excavation Inc. of Seymour to fix a pipe in the middle of Moore Street since that’s in the town’s right of way and tabled a quote of $29,165 for the Marathon project until the April 6 meeting to see if approval is granted by INDOT.

“At this point in time, they are waiting for hydraulics to look at it to help determine what size pipe it needs to be,” town engineer Brad Bender of FPBH Inc. said of INDOT’s response regarding the Marathon project.

Bender said he talked to the town’s utility director, Mason Boicourt, about having King’s do part of the work that goes across the town’s right of way on Marshall Drive and not touch the rest of it. Then the town could negotiate with the contractor on the scope of work and a fee change.

Boicourt, however, said that’s not ideal because the rest of the pipe is in bad shape. The real problem is the backup of water south of the gas station created after a heavy rain, which affects local residents.

“We don’t care so much about the integrity of the pipe because the galvanized pipe in front of the gas station is pretty much just a void underneath the parking lot, so to speak, because the bottom is completely rusted out,” Boicourt said.

“But if we start a little at the end and go across Marshall and extend that just a little way to the actual hole in the road with a (steel) plate over it, with the history behind it, every time we tried to clean that out, right there is where the concrete had been poured in, and that’s where the main issue is,” he said. “That’s holding the water back.”

If that’s opened up, the water will move through the pipes, Boicourt said.

“In theory, I would love to do the whole thing because then it would all be taken care of, but that is a lot of money that technically the town is not responsible for,” Boicourt said, noting the town will try to recoup the money from LLB Food Mart LLC.

Councilman Jamy Greathouse said he doesn’t like a “Band-Aid” fix.

“If we don’t do it all, we’re not really fixing anything because if we don’t go all the way across, we’re still not helping the people south of town. It’s not eliminating much of the issue,” he said.

“We’re hoping that that piece will take care of it, but it may or may not,” he said. “If it deteriorates anymore and we have to get in there, are we looking at higher costs later on of having to dig all of that area up and doing those other things that we would go ahead and rectify it all at one time?”

Boicourt said he’s “pretty positive” the partial fix at about half of the cost will help.

While researching the issue, he said he found town records from a previous engineering firm that completed a stormwater study in 2003, and that included photos of water backed up in the area.

“Here we are in 2021, and it has just gotten worse,” Boicourt said. “Every time it rains, it washes more and more stuff in, and whatever hole or void there is washes debris down in there and gets clogged up.”

He said town employees have jetted mud and debris out of the area to the north, and it takes a few hours each time. While it opens up enough to let water flow through the pipe, water is backed up for several days.

“We did it (March 1) and there’s still water out there,” he said during the March 2 meeting.

Boicourt said the Marathon and Moore Street projects will use up all of the money in the stormwater fund, which residents have been paying into since 2017.

Moore Street is an important fix because a large sinkhole could develop in the middle of a travel lane if it’s not take care of, Boicourt said. There is a 5-foot metal galvanized pipe under the east end of that street that needs to be fixed.

“It’s just going to progressively get worse, and there’s a lot of farm traffic that goes out that way, so I feel like it’s just a no-brainer that it has to be done,” he said. “That one does carry a lot of water.”

It’s possible the work will need to be extended in the area, Boicourt said.

“We need to see what we can get done here to fix what’s the problem, and if the pipe upstream looks bad and it’s hard to connect to, then we may have to revisit that,” he said.

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What: Crothersville Town Council meeting

When: 6 p.m. April 6

Where: Crothersville Town Hall, 111 E. Howard St., Crothersville

Who: Open to the public and press; attendees must wear a mask; the meeting also can be viewed live online at facebook.com/townofcrothersville

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