The Department of Environmental Protection quickly responded to a complaint of an underground water main break under Morris Park Avenue. Local residents and nearby merchants had observed water rising into the street.
On Monday, August 31 DEP work crews were onsite pumping out a large quantity of muddy water from what a DEP spokeswoman described as a break in an underground water pipe that was a private line to a nearby building.
The break caused water to bubble up onto the roadway between Hone and Paulding avenues. The water pooling had been going for weeks, eyewitnesses claimed.
“The water was coming up through a crack in the concrete bus pad a little bit at a time over the course of a couple of weeks,” said Antonio Frasca, owner of a mini market at 1028 Morris Park Avenue. “Every time the bus would go over the concrete pad, it would splash through the water.”
Frasca said that a man living in a building nearby called 311 and that the DEP response was quick and efficient.
“Yesterday, DEP came to inspect and survey damange,” Frasca said. “This morning they dug up the street and began to pump out the water.”
According to DEP spokeswoman Mercedes Padilla, a water supply line from a building on Morris Park Avenue had ruptured underground, and this was causing the build up of water.
Padilla said that while service lines are the responsibility of the individual property owners, in this case the city stepped in to repair the problem at the request of the community. She had no information to release as to which building the water line serviced.
