birdman said:

---

Go look at east entrance of A&M campus. They are putting in some pipelines. I think they're smaller than the proposed lines through Bryan. Look at the giant mess. And look at the width of work space.

Then try to reconcile that with the low impact nonsense that College Station is spouting.

---

This is a 24 inch - "minimal impact" - not to mention all the spoils, the storage area needed for the 24 inch pipes, as well as the construction vehicles needed to do all this.

So College Station is proposing to put this in an area that already has Bryan utilities - water, sewer and Atmos Gas.

Who is responsible for the resulting damage to the streets above - all the potholes from the subsidence in future years

Bryan will be paying for this in years to come - we get the damage and loss of property value and College Station gets all the revenue from the sewage lines servicing TAMU, Northgate and the revitalized University/Texas development.

Dumbfounded said:

---

CS is adamant about constructing a gravity flow sewer pipeline. This is why they abandoned the Hensel Park lift station option and selected the Rosemary option. It is the cheapest and easiest option.

It is hard to tell the actual dimensions of the pictured excavation. Let's assume it is 8'-10' deep and 20'-26' wide. Now consider the depth and width of the required excavation for a 20'+ deep (in some areas) gravity flow line run under Rosemary Drive (which is 20' wide).

I don't know the exact resulting dimensions but I would imagine it would be significantly larger than the pit shown above creating significant damage to the immediate adjacencies.

The current Rosemary design includes a combination of open trench and bored construction. There are 8 bore pits in the current design.

---

Why are they so adamant about doing it that way? If/when they mess up people's property, can those Bryan residents sue the city of College Station? If that's a possibility, they need to start adding legal costs to their estimates. The "cheaper" option might not really be cheaper if you include legal costs.

Just drove down Rosemary. Approx 100 signs in yards "Preserve neighborhood lntegrity. Save Rosemary" or something like that.

Tailgate88 said:

---

Just drove down Rosemary. Approx 100 signs in yards "Preserve neighborhood lntegrity. Save Rosemary" or something like that.

---

Let's hope they do better than the "Save Wellborn" campaign did.

Why is CS so adamant about installing a gravity flow sewer pipeline thru Rosemary? Primarily two reasons that CS continues to state publicly.

1) they don't want to adsorb the additional cost to upgrade the Hensel Park lift station. CS has estimated this @ ~$3.5M. It is my understanding that Bryan just approved a $12M sewer project that includes a lift station. Their lift station estimate is ~$1.5M. I would assume the added cost is somewhere between these two figures.

It is my opinion that the financial beneficiaries of this sewer project should bear the added cost. CS, TAMU and the numerous developers constructing or have plans to construct in Northgate, Century Square and Hensel park appear to the the true beneficiaries. Have these 3 entities share in the added cost. This would be a minimal financial impact to each and keep a CS project within the CS city limits.

2) CS doesn't want future maintenance issues w a lift station. It is my understanding that CS currently has ~17 lift stations w more in the works. Will there be a need for maintenance, yes, but this seems more of an excuse not solid reasoning. Bryan operates ~40 lift stations and has publicly stated that 100% of Bryan's sewer runs thru a lift station. They have also stated they have not had a catastrophic failure in the 40 years of operating lift stations.

I assume there is always the option for Bryan residents to sue and it surely would be an added cost and annoyance to CS to defend the suits. I don't know how City governments budget for legal costs. I do know that CS has added a 25% contingency to the sewer project estimates.

Although A&M claims to have no voice or stake in this controversy, you have to wonder because they clearly have plans to develop Hensel Park. The CS lift station in Hensel Park needs to vanish for those plans to go forward. College Station would need to enhance that lift station to avoid destroying Bryan Neighborhoods. You have to wonder what kind of silent agreement there is between CS and A&M. And by the way, A&M's development of Hensel Park could negatively impact another South Bryan neighborhood, North Oakwood, located just across the creek from Hensel.

This whole thing now appears to be headed for a condemnation proceeding by CS against Bryan and Beverley Estates. The case law may not be in favor of CS because, in order to condemn, they must show that there is "no other available option" other than a gravity flow route thru Bev Estates. They do have another available option in the Hensel lift station enhancement. In any event, a lawsuit will be a long drawn out affair and very costly to both cities.

Also as I mentioned upstream CoCS has built several lift stations RECENTLY. They are not against lift stations

EliteElectric said:

---

Also as I mentioned upstream CoCS has built several lift stations RECENTLY. They are not against lift stations

---

Yup. They're just against a lift station there, it seems.

Going to share a letter recently sent to the folks on Rosemary from the TAMUS - Apparently TAMU doesn't need the lift station to go……

Quote:

---

Decisions about the sewage infrastructure are up to the City of College Station, and of course, to some extent, with the City of Bryan. Texas A&M is not a decision maker in this discussion. To build the intergenerational living facility that is being contemplated just north of Century Square by the System, the sewage infrastructure being discussed by the City of College Station is not required. If that infrastructure is built, it might make sense for Texas A&M to connect to whatever infrastructure is available at some point down the road. But I repeat, it is not a necessity for the Texas A&M System to move forward with its plans and we are not driving the decision making.

I know there is also some rumor that Texas A&M wants the current lift station that College Station has located on Hensel Park property removed. That is not true. In fact, the Board of Regents recently approved an extension of the easement late last year. The current efforts to re-do Hensel Park are not about some large commercial development on that land. We are working with both College Station and Bryan to improve the park into a better open space, high quality park. And the planners working on that have been told to assume that the lift station may need to remain at its current location.

Our hope is that the two cities work this out amicably and in a way that makes the best sense for everyone involved, and that the good working relationship that has been built in the last year or so between the two cities, the University and the County continues to grow.

Again, happy to discuss if that's helpful. Thanks.

Greg Hartman
Chief Operating Officer & Senior Vice President
Texas A&M University
Vice Chancellor | Texas A&M University System

---

One has to continue to ask - the original plan by CoCS in their Capital Improvement documents was to fund and build a rehabbed lift station in Hensel Park
They already rehabbed Cooner Street sewage lines to accept the increased capacity that the rehabbed lift station would create and with the funding already approved, rehab the lines that Cooner Street lines connect to. This is in line with the additional development that CoCS wants to do in the University and Texas crossroads -

So what changed - why then did they decide it was better to destroy a neighboring city's street when they had already decided to rehab their own lines and stay within their city limits.

All the posturing and narrative that was presented by the CoCS City Manager to the Rosemary neighborhood group who met at CoCS City Hall, touted the unreliability of a lift station - the danger of a lift station - "we don't want lift stations"…….if he said it once he said it 4 times - and yet, just 24 hours before, the City of Bryan Public Works Director informed the Bryan City Council that 100% of Bryan lines at one time or another relied on lift stations. Indeed the CoB Council in that same meeting approved a multi million dollar lift station. AND even more damning - there are lift stations all over College Station.

So what is really going on here -

Quote:

---

Decisions about the sewage infrastructure are up to the City of College Station, and of course, to some extent, with the City of Bryan. Texas A&M is not a decision maker in this discussion. To build the intergenerational living facility that is being contemplated just north of Century Square by the System, the sewage infrastructure being discussed by the City of College Station is not required. If that infrastructure is built, it might make sense for Texas A&M to connect to whatever infrastructure is available at some point down the road. But I repeat, it is not a necessity for the Texas A&M System to move forward with its plans and we are not driving the decision making.

I know there is also some rumor that Texas A&M wants the current lift station that College Station has located on Hensel Park property removed. That is not true. In fact, the Board of Regents recently approved an extension of the easement late last year. The current efforts to re-do Hensel Park are not about some large commercial development on that land. We are working with both College Station and Bryan to improve the park into a better open space, high quality park. And the planners working on that have been told to assume that the lift station may need to remain at its current location.

Our hope is that the two cities work this out amicably and in a way that makes the best sense for everyone involved, and that the good working relationship that has been built in the last year or so between the two cities, the University and the County continues to grow.

Again, happy to discuss if that's helpful. Thanks.

Greg Hartman
Chief Operating Officer & Senior Vice President
Texas A&M University
Vice Chancellor | Texas A&M University System

---

COCS, are you listening?

Don't even think about trying to sell this as a money-saving decision. Should we make a list of things you have spent taxpayer money on that make orders of magnitude of less sense?

Tap the brakes. Do the right thing.

AggiePhil said:

---

I wonder how this whole thing would change if COCS annexed the Rosemary area.

---

Kinda hard to do since it's in the Bryan city limits.

Probably would have a revolt by both the homeowners who intentionally chose Bryan to live in as well as the Bryan taxpayers who will lose by the reduction of property values and property taxes.

And that question of damages continues to be a question College Station can not answer or refuses to explain.

Loss of property value due to loss of neighborhood integrity and ambiance hurts Bryan - so how does College Station propose to compensate Bryan for the loss of property value.

It doesn't. And therefore Bryan should just say - "Stay in your own city limits, College Station."

There is no pathway through Bryan that does not damage property values.

College Station has an alternative route that it originally planned. USE it and stay out of Bryan.

Glad both cities are spending all this time and resources to improve our community. This is very productive!