Welcome to OnsideBuffalo - "OnSide" Buffalo Oklahoma - Buffalo Blog -of the town of Buffalo Oklahoma

Late Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson said,
"It is not the function of our government to keep the citizen from falling into error; it is the function of the citizen to keep the government from falling into error."

This blog is for people to share their thoughts and ideas on things of interest in this town of Buffalo Oklahoma.


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Saturday, December 6, 2008

CITY MANAGER....BLOWING SMOKE?

At the last meeting, the city manager mentioned doing a smoke test on the sewer lines of Buffalo. What is this? This test is primarily used to detect areas of unwarranted inflow into the sewer system. Such would be roof gutter and/or down spouts that are hooked into the home sewer lines. Storm water drainage pipes that are cross connected with the sewer lines. Old abandoned houses and building sewer lines that may be allowing surface water to enter the system. There may be old lateral lines, from septic systems which have been hooked into the sewer system. Leakage around manhole cover rings may also be a problem. The smoke test may also detect damaged and leaking joints in sewer pipes and other overflow problems with the sewer system. And of course illegal connections such as dog kennels equipped to rinse down their mess.
Basically it is finding areas that when it rains, that rain enters the sewer system and unnecessarily gets dumped into the sewer lagoons.

When the smoke test is performed the areas are marked and then they can be evaluated for possible corrections. This smoke is toxic and will make you very sick if you inhale it, that is, if it doesn’t kill you first. The number of people killed will reduce the numbers that use the sewer system and bring the system back to capacity, thus saving the town thousand upon thousand of dollars! (Just kidding!!)
“It is actually non-toxic, harmless and has no odor.”

This approach would be used for a situation where the capacity of the treatment system based on population or actual usage was not an issue and yet the system was still exceeding capacity. So for finding troubles with the lines themselves and addressing extra water that may enter the sewer system illegally the smoke test would be used. This smoke and mirrors approach will not address the capacity issue at hand. It will only generate more disbelief about the capacity issue. Blowing smoke is not the answer, even though it is the norm. Hasn’t there been a big enough can of worms opened already? Let the sleeping dogs lie.

6 comments:

  1. For gosh sakes, just fix the lagoons already! D.E.Q knows what they are talking about. Take the blinders off!!

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  2. Okay, I'll bite. What is the photographic evidence?

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  3. The new aerial photo showing the lagoons of Buffalo's wastewater treament facility with a ditch cut through cell number seven.(upper right cell-lefthand side of cell) Calling the jog on the left of this cell the "panhandle" you can see a brown dash with a dark dash in the center of it. That is the ditch that was cut through the dikes. Also a strange brown color "trickles" north of the "panhandle" area of cell seven going upwards and to the right. I sure hope everyone telling the stories to the authorities had their timelines accurate because there will be a known date on this aerial photo.

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  4. To Greg harper-
    How did you obtain those photos and videos so carefully shown on your blog and on InciteBiffalo's website???

    Interesting to note that these could not have been obtained without someone (presumably you) setting foot on Town of Buffalo property (the wastewater treatment plant). So, unless you had written or express permission from the Town of Buffalo, you are GUILTY OF TRESPASS...or did you conveniently ignore those "NO TRESPASSING" signs posted around the perimeter of the wastewater treatment plant? How considerate of you to have displayed the evidence of your crime on the web. Brilliant.

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  5. Everyone in Town knows the gates are open every Saturday for depositing refuse and for leaving wood, leaves and debris at the sewer ponds.
    It's in the minutes of a multitude of Town Board meetings and has not been considered trespassing. I'm the one who took the pictures and sent them to this blog and to Inside Buffalo. What do you think of that?
    Duhhh - hey why not do your research ? It shows your ignorance. Who's the brilliant one now? Showing your crime of ignorance is worse than anything above mentioned.

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  6. No trespassing on city owned property?mmmmm that could include city hall, the library, duckwalls, stone city park, the city park, doby springs park, the golf course. Come on, use a little common sense, This is one of the reasons Buffalo is as it is. Don't take pictures or write anything wrong or bad about Buffalo, we don't want everyone in town knowing things are bad. Its much easier to keep things quiet if only a handful of people know what the problems are. Not only are the gates open on sat the south gate is open just about anytime so people can haul their tree branches away. I suppose the city could lock that gate and have the city crews pick up everyones branches. I know of 2 piles of old branches that have been lying by the side of the street for over 6 months. Yea, it would probably be a good idea to leave the gate unlocked.

    ReplyDelete