The city of Aurora is looking to finish construction of a new well at Fire Station 10 with the purchase of a new pump and motor.
The new well located at 2390 W. Illinois Ave. is set to replace one that collapsed in 2022, bringing the city’s water production division back up to 18 wells in total, according to Superintendent of Water Production Bob Leible. Construction is currently in its second of three phases, and the Aurora City Council could soon consider a contract for the third phase with a cost of around $178,000.
“This is a big engineering project,” Leible said.
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Aurora collects water from wells and the Fox River, which then goes through the city’s water treatment plant before being piped out to users like businesses and homes. Although it changes day to day, wells provide on average about 40% of the city’s water while the rest comes from the river, Leible said.
He presented city staff’s proposed contract for phase three of construction, which includes the installation of the new well’s pump and motor, to the Aurora City Council’s Infrastructure and Technology Committee on Sept. 22. That committee unanimously voted in favor of the contract with Water Well Solutions of Elburn, so it will now go before the Committee of the Whole on Tuesday before heading to City Council for final approval.
The new well, called Well 105 in city documents, is a shallow well cut into bedrock, Leible told The Beacon-News. The well that previously collapsed, which is why a new well is being built, was also shallow but was a sand and gravel well, he said.
The city is set to once again have six shallow wells once this new one is finished in 2026, according to Leible. He said Aurora also has 12 deep wells.
Phase one of construction was the actual drilling of the well, which ended up costing around $500,000, though the Aurora City Council approved up to roughly $712,000 for the work, Leible said.
With that borehole about 200 feet deep into limestone, phase two began, he said.
This part of the process, which is still happening, has seen the construction of underground “site improvements” like piping, valves and the like, according to Leible. He said all of that needs to be put in new because the site has never held a well before.
The Aurora City Council previously approved a contract of up to $963,000 for phase two of construction, Leible said.
If the newly-proposed phase three contract is approved by City Council at an upcoming meeting, the equipment to be purchased still won’t come in for another 22 weeks, he said.
In addition to the equipment purchase, the proposed contract also includes the installation of the equipment as well as start up and testing before the well is commissioned, according to a staff report on the proposal. City staff said in the report that the contract itself is for roughly $158,000, the lowest bid received that met the requirements, but a $20,000 contingency was also added into the proposal. Contingencies are typical in city contracts.
The new well is expected to pump out about 900 to 1,000 gallons per minute, based on testing, Leible said. That’s around double what the now-collapsed well this one is replacing used to put out, he said.
According to Leible, Aurora does not routinely drill new wells “because we have a lot of them to work with.” He said the last time the city dug wells to increase its capacity was in around 2008.