Sometime between waking up and showering and mid morning, the water in our house turned off today. I called a neighbor and their water was fine. I filed a 311 report via the city’s web site and then waited, After about an hour I decided that I need to talk to a human about it to get some idea of how long it was likely to be off.
I talked to a very pleasant woman in the water department. She checked and didn’t see any scheduled work in our neighborhood. She also hadn’t heard of any emergencies (e.g. broken main, etc) in the area. She suggested that the most likely culprit was a frozen meter …. and then the lightbulb went off.
As I mentioned once long ago in a thread on Village14, we discovered a truly bizarre detail about our 1840s era house, six months after we moved in. We kept getting cards from the city asking us to read our water meter and I could not find the water meter. Eventually the city sent someone out and he couldn’t find the water meter. At his suggestion, I contacted the woman who sold us the house and she said “I’m so sorry. I forgot to tell you that your water meter is in another house – it’s the blue house on High St (i.e. a different street). And there it’s been ever since.
As soon as the woman at the Water Dept mentioned frozen water meter I remembered that the blue house on High St was sold this past month and is now empty. I realized that they must have turned off the heat and my water meter in their basement froze.
The city said that they’d need to get into this neighbor’s house to check it out. That led to a five step process from my next door neighbor, to his brother, to a lawyer, to another lawyer, to the new owner of the blue house. I explained the situation to him and he said “yeah, that makes sense. I was over there this morning and turned the water off.”
So it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought. There was no frozen meter. He came over a few hours later and turned our water back on. He was very pleasant but pretty adamant that I will need to start the process of getting my water meter out of his basement.
The surprising thing is that neither of our deeds mention anything about this strikingly strange set up. I also heard from my other next door neighbor today that our sewer line also is connected into his.
I did recently see an old map that showed that in 1850 the land his house is on was part of my property. My guess is that an earlier owner of my house built this 2nd house on their property and when water service came to the area it was probably just easier to plumb it that way – it’s an Upper Falls thing.
… but no, that’s not really a photo of my plumbing
Glad that’s not your plumbing, Jerry, although your meter and sewer set-up is really weird. The picture looks more like a science fiction rendition of a “heart-lung bypass machine” for a robot! 😉
Weird!! I actually got a little note from the water people today saying they couldn’t read our water meter (not sure if it was mine or the other apartment in the building). They had sent somebody out to troubleshoot the wireless transmitter thingy to no success and needed access to the main meter. First time this has happened… anyway I think yours is much odder, We don’t have such things in Newtonville 😀
Good luck Jerry, The process ahead of you may be more complicated than you think. However I hope not. Do tell us how it all turns out.
The Life of (Jerry) Reilly continues to amaze.
@Jerry. I think some fund should be set up to keep this Rube Goldberg setup exactly the way it is now. I’ll bet there are a lot of hidden surprises on High Street that we don’t know about.
First person asks city to shut off water service for vacant building. Second person gets it turned back on… Next week’s story will be “High Street not the High; Flooding Continues”
@Hoss – No, the city wasn’t involved as it turned out. The new homeowner turned my water off in the morning and then came back later in the day and turned it back on.
@Bob Burke – I’m sure you’re right about hidden surprises. Here’s one that’s likely to cause problems while trying to move my water feed out of the neighbors basement.
As far as I know, there is no water main on my tiny street (Spring St) and my water is coming off the water main on High St, through my neighbor’s basement My neighbor said that if necessary, he’s be OK with my water line running through his property so long as it wasn’t in his basement. To do that it would have to run on the VERY narrow strip (6-8 foot?) strip between the houses. I was told by my next door neighbor on Spring St that he discovered, while digging in that strip with a pickaxe a few years ago, that there’s an ancient, previously unknown brick culvert or storm drain in that strip that has steadily running water in it.
In short, this is definitely not the end of our water pipe saga.
Historic Newton is presenting a talk this month on “Worker Housing and Mill Buildings in Upper Falls”. Maybe I can convince them to add a section on “The Coming of Indoor Plumbing for the Worker’s Housing”
Jerry, that culvert may be one of Newton’s many underground streams. At the history museum they should have some old maps of your neighborhood before the 19th century when people started to move nature around to suit their purposes. There are lots of streams in Newton that were covered up or re-routed in order to better accommodate a farmer, drain a wetland or build a house.
So, Jerry, that pictured contraption. It feeds one of the taps at Dunn Geherin’s, right?
Good one, it is called “Distill” http://ananascomosus.wordpress.com/2010/12/03/james-cohen-gallery/
As of 1892, Spring Street looks to be high and dry.
Hero-gram for the Water Dept!! –
This is the 2nd time in a couple of years I’ve had dealings with the city’s Water & Sewer department. The last time was about a very large surprise bill due to extended estimated meter readings. So both times I was dealing with an unpleasant situation and both times all the people I dealt with were friendly, knowledgeable, responsive and just generally pleasant to deal with.
In response to my call yesterday, Bob Sullivan from the Water Dept called this morning. He had done his homework. He had pulled all the drawings and taken a drive by and checked out reality on the ground. He said if I liked, he could come by this afternoon, take a look in the my basement to figure out some details, and then explain how to get this all done.
The good news is the city will run a water line at their expense up Spring St to the front of our house. The bad news of course is that I’ll need to hire plumber to make the hook up in our house … but that’s as expected, and not the city’s job.
It will all wait until the spring when the ground thaws. It’s waited for 100 years already so I’m not worried about a few more months.
By the way, Bob Sullivan says that he’s run into this (water lines or meters in neighbor’s properties) a couple of times before. These kinds of things pretty much only crop up in either Upper Falls or the Lake according to Bob.
I guess the rest of the city is just very particular about their plumbing and think there’s something wrong with neighbors pipes being in their house 😉
We once looked at a house (not in Newton) that had a beautiful custom shed (that matched the house) built on the neighbor’s property (whoops). There was some special language in the deed and real estate tax information, but that alone frightened us away from the deal. The neighbors at the time were fine with this “deal” but you never know who moves in, and could tear down the shed or make your life miserable!
Jerry Reilly — You must be the most easy going resident of Newton. What if you found that the new buyer of the place the meter is in intends to flip and sell? You’re removing an easement at your own expense, and they will profit by it. Strike a deal!
@Hoss – as far as anyone can see, there is no easement, there’s just reality on the ground (or in the pipes).
Jerry Reilly — Trust, but verify comes to mind… If in fact the city subdivided properties w/o individual water meters… that in itself seems like a mistake If the city is willing to pay the price of correction up to a physical meter in your basement, then I’d go with it and pay a plumber to reroute. But if you have anything that might be damaged — stone walls, shrubs, lawn, moving the washer/dryer etc… Watch out for your wallet. The cost of status qua is zero on your side; some acknowledged inconvenience on the other side; and a uncertain situation on the city side. Leverage is on your side [I’d take a look at the closing docs on the MA land records database online; free insight on what the buyer/buyer lawyer saw] Maybe you’ve though of all these things… just an alert in case you get to the point that it is costing you more than you get
Hoss has a good point. This could get worse. When the city and your contractor put in the new water lines, you can look forward to their heavy machinery “finding” your gas line (if you have one), your sewer line, the abandoned buried fuel oil tank from 90 years ago, a new superfund site due to some long-forgotten Upper Falls industry, Jimmy Hoffa…
The city can put one of those wireless transmitters on the meter where it is now. You should go back to your neighbor and argue for the status quo – tell him to look on the bright side. It could have been your sewer line in his basement.
@Bruce – Thanks for cheering me up 😉
“Jerry, that culvert may be one of Newton’s many underground streams.”
@Margaret – I remember some of those very well. One is now underneath a row of buildings that were built on Thurston road (I remember this plot of land as woods, no structures).
@Jerry. Bruce has an excellent point. Is there any real need to change this arrangement?? It seems to have been working well for at least a century. It’s probably the only such Rube Goldberg in Newton and maybe the entire Nation. Tourists might actually flock here to see it. You could also tell the owner on High Street that this unique water meter system is an integral part of the Upper Falls Historic District and that it can’t be changed , altered or removed without the approval of the Upper Falls Historic Commission, Upper Falls Neighborhood Area Council, Upper Falls Community Development Corporation and Alderman Yates who is not only Dean of the Board, but President of Friends of Hemlock Gorge which has some claim to your part of Upper Falls. I’m sure the new owner on High Street will see reason when you tell him that Marie is on the Area Council. Hang tough.
@Bob – OK, I’m filling out that National Historic Landmark application today.
All’s well that ends well.
A water line now runs up Spring St for the first time in recorded history and there is now a new water line running into my house. It’s not connected to my plumbing yet but the new neighbor who started this all has magnanimously agreed to have his plumbers install the meter and make the connection to my plumbing.
At the moment, the city crew is just finishing patching the asphalt on the street. The whole thing couldn’t have gone more smoothly or cheaply thanks to the City Water & Sewer Dept and the new neighbor.
I know that for all practical reasons, having my own water meter in my own house is a good thing. Somehow though I’m a bit sad that I’ve lost the unique distinction of being the only person I’ve ever met that had his water meter in someone else’s house.
Now that this great saga is completed, perhaps Jerry can start a thread on the re-dedication of the Civil War Soldiers Monument on Sunday at 1:00 p.M. at the Newton Cemetery to be followed by the Memorial Parade on Walnut Street in Newtonville and Watertown Street in Nonantum.
Alderman Brian Yates
Thank you< Jerry,