Themercury

The Mercury
Plumber Power: Pottstown Loosens Sewer Restriction

[Reprinted with permission of the Mercury]

By Erik Engquist
Mercury Staff Writer

Pottstown- Pressured by angry plumbers, borough council moved Wednesday to water down the ban on sewer traps it imposed last winter. Council will vote Monday to have the ordinance rewritten to reflect a compromise worked out by the Pottstown Sewer Authority and the Building Industries Exchange of Pottstown & Vicinity, a contractors' association.

A trap is a bend in the sewer pipe where water collects, preventing odors from passing from the sewer main into a home. Most buildings in Pottstown have a trap in the lateral pipe leading to the street. But because all sinks, toilets and other plumbing fixtures also have traps, so called building traps are redundant and merely allow ground water to seep into sewer pipes, borough officials said.

Council, on the recommendation of the Pottstown Sewer Authority, therefore mandated the removal of building traps when work is done on lateral pipes, and banned the installation of new traps. But when work of the ordinance leaked out to local plumbers, they raised their wrenches in protest.

The Plumbers argued that building traps are an important safeguard in case sink and toilet traps dry out from lack of use. The plumbers also contended that building traps, when accompanied by a clean-out pipe ( as is common in Pottstown), make it easy to clear blockages.

Borough officials countered that most blockages occur in the traps themselves, and that plumbers make money clearing them. The borough also noted that building traps are unheard of in most parts of the country, and are not part of the national building code.

"If you vent the building properly and trap all the fixtures properly, you don't need the building trap," said Potstown wastewater collection supervisor Bob McNichols. "Now, some plumbers will argue that point".

Count Abram Ecker among them. "To say that you don't need a trap is ludicrous," said Ecker, a local plumber for most of this century.

Borough officials said Wednesday that the compromise plan will better protect older homes and make plumbers' jobs easier.

At the same time, will not affect the borough's effort to reduce inflow and infiltration, or 1/1, which overburdens the sewage treatment plant when it rains.

"We feel the 1/1 program can move ahead without any negative impact," said Sewer Authority Engineer Tom Weld. The ordinance will be modified to allow traps to be relocated from under the curb to four feet from the home, they are less susceptible to infiltration by ground water...