Recommended Lower Paradise Flooding Remedy Estimate: $4.4 million

Engineers who completed a conceptual $40,000 study of drainage in the lower Paradise Road area presented four alternatives to selectmen Wednesday.

Chief among the alternatives that Kleinfelder engineering representatives presented was an estimated $4.4 million alternative to alleviate flooding on Paradise Road near Franklin Avenue and Swampscott Avenue; lower Banks Road near Farragut Road; and Shaw Road and Elmwood Road.

Other options, whose costs would range from $750,000 to $1.9 million, address flooding in smaller, isolated areas.  The consultants recommended the $4.4 million option, saying it would alleviate flooding in the largest area.

That option calls for installing larger, 36-inch drainage pipes and a 4-foot by 6-foot box culvert, Kleinfelders' representative Mark Thompson said.

"The specific area studied is the catchment area and drain pipe network tributary to the Stacey's Brook outfall to King's Beach," the Kleinfelder report summary states. "The land area included in the catchment is nearly 25 percent of the town's total land area."

"(The $4.4 million option) creates a larger backbone for the drainage system," Thompson said.

The conceptual study findings were preliminary. Thompson said the engineering group's estimates were conservative.

The next step, he said, would be a preliminary design to find out more about cost factors including those related to what the state would require of the project and the digging conditions.

Residents whose homes have been inundated by water from flooding thanked selectmen for the conceptual study and asked that they consider proposing a remedy to prevent future home and road flooding.

Town Administrator Tom Younger said he planned to meet Thursday with the town's finance officer and DPW Director Gino Cresta to talk about funding.

Any capital funding proposal would have to flow through the capital improvement panel on its way to Town Meeting.

In 2012 Town Meeting approved the $40,000 for the lower Paradie Road drainage study. 

The engineering contractor measured stormwater flow and collected video of drainage pipe conditions before creating computer models and testing them under flooding scenarios.