Calgary's water system is in 'recovery mode,' says mayor
Officials say over 3.5 billion litres have been saved since feeder main break
Since city officials announced indoor water consumption could return to normal this week, Calgarians appear to be easing back into their regular water use habits.
According to city officials, 478 million litres of treated water was used on Tuesday and usage increased mostly in the evening. During the height of the water crisis, the city aimed to keep daily usage below 480 million litres.
On Tuesday, the city said indoor water use could return to normal, though Mayor Jyoti Gondek continued to urge residents to ease back into their regular water-use habits as crews work to fully stabilize the system.
During the city's scheduled afternoon update on Wednesday, Gondek used surgery as an analogy to explain the current state of the city's water system.
"We are now in post-op, we are in recovery mode, and we need to monitor how our patient is doing," she said.
"The last thing we want to do is put the feeder main or the system at risk again."
The city remains under a state of local emergency and outdoor Stage 4 water restrictions and a citywide fire ban remain in place as crews determine how the system will respond to the easing of indoor conservation measures.
"We need to keep the whole system stable at this current level of pressure before we can relax to a lesser set of outdoor water restrictions" said Sue Henry, chief of the Calgary Emergency Management Agency, on Wednesday.
To date, the city's 311 service has received over 11,200 calls related to water misuse and the fire ban. Bylaw officers have issued 19 tickets for water misuse, and six tickets for violating the fire ban.
Henry says all city-owned pools reopened on Wednesday, but certain features — such as hot tubs, water slides and kiddie pools — have not yet been reopened.
As for outdoor pools, the city says these recreational spaces won't reopen until the city reaches at least Stage 3 outdoor water restrictions.
The state of local emergency expires on Thursday, and the city will review whether to renew or lift it as they monitor the situation.
The City of Calgary's general manager of infrastructure services, Michael Thompson, said on Tuesday the Bearspaw south feeder main — which ruptured on June 5 — is operating at 50 per cent capacity for now, and restoring normal water supply also means taking some of the stress off of the rest of the system.
The mayor says that, since the feeder main broke, over 3.5 billion litres of water have been conserved compared to what's typically used in Calgary by this time of year.
3rd-party review will take at least a year
In mid-June, the city confirmed there would be a full, third-party review into what caused the catastrophic failure behind the feeder main's rupture. The scope of its work is wide ranging and the City of Calgary's top bureaucrat, chief administrative officer David Duckworth, is spearheading the plan to put it together.
On Wednesday, a city council committee heard it will take at least one year from now for Calgarians to know the full scope and scale of what happened behind the feeder main break.
"We do expect the report, likely, will not be before council until some time later in 2025," said Duckworth.
"We need to make sure, again, this is an independent, thorough review so that the public has trust and confidence in the City of Calgary."
However, several members of council criticized the planned scope of the review during Wednesday's committee meeting, saying city administrators should not limit the work done by a panel of experts.
"I think the vast majority of us on that committee felt that we were trying to make an independent process too administration heavy," said Gondek during Wednesday regular water update when asked about the review.
"So it has gone back and we've asked CAO Duckworth to come back to us with something that's considerably more independent."
Gondek told CBC Radio's Calgary Eyeopener on Wednesday morning that she feels confident this third-party review will shed light on what could be improved upon within the city's water infrastructure system.
She says the independent review will be able to pinpoint the cause behind the rupture, what measures might be needed to prevent a repeat of the situation and to analyze the city's response to the crisis.
City council is expected to receive an update on the review at its meeting on July 30.