ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, November 9, 1996 TAG: 9611110020
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER
THE CONSTRUCTION ON THE HILL sometimes makes their back yard a mess. And a dispute over a proposed drainage pipe has made the situation murkier.
The mud started flowing onto Roy and Elizabeth Edwards' Van Winkle Road property Sept.4.
Since then, whenever it rains, light-brown muddy streams have returned to the retired couple's yard. Their mostly wooded property is in a semi-rural corner of the city behind Hunting Hills shopping center.
* On Sept. 11, an inch or more of mud covered part of the floor of an enclosed porch off their basement. It also created a small tunnel beneath their backyard shed, which now leans slightly.
* On Sept. 16, mud streams inundated their yard once again, leaving a 7-foot-wide slick across their back yard grass. They said that scene was repeated Sept. 28; then Oct. 8 and 9; again Oct.18.
* On Friday, four mud streams of varying widths crisscrossed their back yard, forming a mud pond on a low-lying wooded section of their property about 150 feet from their house. Just north of the house, another slick covered Van Winkle Road for a 30-foot stretch.
The source of all the mud is a construction site behind Wal-Mart, where Smith/Packett-Medcom is building a nursing home to replace the city nursing home at Coyner Springs.
Contractors have clear-cut and bulldozed most of a large hill that rises from the Edwardses' back yard. Now it's a huge mound of dirt. Sediment controls in place can't nearly contain runoff from even light rains, the Edwardses said.
"We've got water in the back yard and down the hill," Elizabeth Edwards, 71, said Friday. "My husband, he's had two heart attacks, and he's getting ready to have another one. If it goes on much longer, they might as well build the nursing home behind our house, because we'll have all the dirt down here."
Meanwhile, the Edwardses contend, everybody involved in the project has given them the runaround. That includes the city office of planning and community development; Smith/Packett-Medcom; Engineering Concepts, the site engineer; and the excavator, Thomas Brothers Inc.
"This is the way they fix it: They don't," she said.
Early in September, the city ordered Thomas Brothers to clean sediment traps, install additional rip-rap, and rebuild silt fences ringing the dirt mound. But afterward, the mud still flowed.
The city also ordered Thomas Brothers to install a temporary 24-inch pipe across the Edwardses' property to handle excess runoff that sediment traps couldn't handle. The Edwardses agreed to that, but told the contractor to leave when workers showed up with a 4-inch pipe instead. Joe Thomas, of Thomas Brothers, said the city agreed to the smaller diameter after discussions with the contractor and site engineer.
"I wouldn't let them put [the 4-inch pipe] in," said Roy Edwards, a retired carpenter and quarry superintendent. "It wouldn't do any good. It would have been a mess."
But the final insult came, the Edwardses said, when a city inspector assigned to the job repeatedly advised them to sell the modest home they've lived in for 16 years and move. Both of them are in ill health and live in the basement because they can't safely manage the stairs.
"We do not want to sell our place," Elizabeth Edwards said. "We just want to be left alone."
Representatives of the contractor, the city, the engineering firm and Smith/Packett-Medcom said heavy rains in September created runoff that the sediment control system couldn't handle.
And, they added, the muddy yard is partly the Edwardses' fault, because the couple wouldn't let them install the 4-inch pipe. John Marlles, chief of community planning, said the wider pipe was proposed by the city. But Engineering Concepts wanted to increase the size of the sediment trap and install a smaller pipe instead - and the city agreed.
"I think we're trying to do anything we can do," Marlles said. "We've had a wet year, and it's an active construction site. With construction sites this large, you're going to have these types of problems."
Dan Conner, the city inspector, could not be reached for comment. But "Dan is pretty adamant that he never told [the Edwardses] to sell their property or anything along those lines," Marlles said.
Joe Thomas said the site will be seeded soon, probably next week. Within several weeks, the erosion problems should end, he said.
Jack Ellingwood, the site engineer, said all the sediment control plans were reviewed and approved by the city. Marlles acknowledged that they met city code.
"What we tried, [the Edwardses] wouldn't agree to; after that, we were at a loss about what to do," said Preston Moore, vice president of development for Smith/Packett-Medcom. "We want to be sensitive. But we're working as fast as we can, not only to get the site done, but to get the seeding in. Hopefully, the drainage will be less then than what it was before we started work."
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: STEPHANIE KLEIN-DAVIS/Staff. Elizabeth and Roy Edwardsby CNBhave trouble with muddy water running through the back yard of their
home in Roanoke. color.