Frenchman Hills Road rebuild nearly done
A mostly rebuilt section of Frenchman Hills Road near Road G.5 SW behind the “Road Closed” barricades that had been washed away when a canal operated by the Quincy Columbia Basin Irrigation District was breached in several places in the early hours of Friday, March 21. The work to rebuild the road has cost the county roughly $325,000, according to Public Works Director Sam Castro.
CHARLES H. FEATHERSTONE/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
An irrigation canal breached the morning of March 20, closing down a portion of Frenchman Hills Road that had been washed out as a result. Costs to the irrigation district and county for road and canal repairs, combined, have so far exceeded $1 million, though insurance is expected to mitigate some of those costs.
QUINCY — Grant County road crews have nearly finished repairing stretches of Frenchman Hills Road that were washed out when a canal failed in March.
“The only thing left is to brush the chip sealing,” said Grant County Engineer Dave Bren, adding the repaired portions of the road will also be striped.
In an email to the Columbia Basin Herald, Grant County Public Works Director Sam Castro wrote the work to rebuild eight areas of the road damaged when the canal was breached — including a more-than half-mile stretch that was completely washed away — has cost the county around $325,000.
“The county is paying the initial costs,” Castro wrote in an email to the Columbia Basin Herald. “A claim has been filed with the Quincy Columbia Basin Irrigation District’s insurer for damages.”
Portions of Frenchman Hills Road between Adams Road and Dodson Road were damaged when sensors regulating the filling of a feeder canal operated by the QCBID failed early on the morning of March 20, leading to higher than normal water levels in the feeder canal — known as the W61 feeder lateral — which then eroded portions of the dykes retaining the canal.
QCBID Secretary/Manager Roger Sonnichsen said via email that the district repaired the canal and restored water service to around 15,000 irrigated acres in the hills between Quincy and Royal City. Those repairs were completed about a week later than was estimated.
“Water was provided to the landowners impacted a week later than originally scheduled, which was March 28,” Sonnichsen wrote. “The initial repair work has cost the QCBID $750,000.”
According to a report from Nicholls Kovich, an engineering firm tasked by Grant County to evaluate the damage, around 2,100 feet of Frenchman Hills Road sustained damage to the asphalt pavement and roadway slopes, while in several places significant silt had built up as well.
Bren said the cost to repair and rebuild Frenchman Hills Road is fairly low because the road was a chip seal road to begin with. The process involves putting down a layer of gravel and then coating it with a thick, oily asphalt, Bren said, and it's the way the county builds most of its paved rural roads.
“It’s a really cheap way of doing roads,” he said. “It lasts for a decade, but it won’t last for 20 or 30 years.”
Sonnichsen confirmed in his email that the costs for repairing Frenchman Hills Road would be submitted to the district’s insurance company.
The QCBID is one of three irrigation districts that deliver water from the Grand Coulee Dam to farmers within the Bureau of Reclamation’s Columbia Basin Project. It provides water to roughly 275,000 acres through hundreds of miles of pipes, ditches and feeder canals connected to the Bureau’s 88-mile-long West Canal.
Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at cfeatherstone@columbiabasinherald.com.
