Ogden official reports fix in the works to water drainage issue at BDO site | News, Sports, Jobs

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Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

Tim Vandenack, Standard Examiner

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Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

Tim Vandenack, Standard Examiner

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Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

Tim Vandenack, Standard Examiner

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Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

Standing water on the east side of 1200 West in Ogden, adjacent to new warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, photographed Monday, Dec. 12, 2022. The standing water is a sore point for residents to the west across the roadway, which is Marriott-Slaterville.

MARRIOTT-SLATERVILLE — An Ogden official reports that steps have been taken to address one of the adverse side effects of construction of several warehouses in Business Depot Ogden, a project that has carried out many living across 1200 West in abutting Marriott-Slaterville.

Persistent standing water along 1200 West on the west side of the new warehouse structures has been an on-and-off issue going back to at least last year, creating breeding grounds for mosquitoes, critics say.

“If it stays there, we get mosquitoes,” said Lois Slater, who lives on 1200 West, across from the newly developed area in Marriott-Slaterville.

Kerry Wayne, who also lives in the impacted 1200 West stretch, has brought up the issue repeatedly to Ogden officials, most recently in an email to Ogden Mayor Mike Caldwell last week. He said Boyer Co., manager of the city-owned Business Depot Ogden, or BDO, created the water issue when it covered the area between 1200 West and the new warehouses with a layer of heavy dirt that doesn’t readily allow water to drain into the subsoil.

“I am asking again, who in your administration is responsible for cleaning up this mess and what is their timetable for promptly completing the project? Silence is not a solution,” Wayne said in the Dec. 7 emails.

Mark Johnson, Ogden’s chief administrative officer, responded on Friday, citing a response to the issue that he received from Boyer Co.

Rocky Mountain Power recently removed the last of several power poles it needed to take out from the area, allowing crews to go in to do remedial work to address the drainage issue, a Boyer rep wrote to Johnson. More specifically, a contractor dug six sumps in the 1200 South section south of 400 North, which will serve to collect and percolate excess stormwater.

“The sumps are working well, but with the amount of moisture that we continue to receive, it has made it difficult to fine grade and finish landscaping the project,” the BDO rep said in the message to Johnson, provided in the response to Wayne .

The failure to complete proposed landscaping beside the warehouses, meant to serve as a visual buffer for residents to the west, has been another point of contention. “If we can get enough of a break in storms to allow for the ground to dry up, we hope to finish the landscaping during the winter months. If the storms continue, the landscaping won’t be completed until the spring,” the BDO rep said in the letter.

As of Monday, standing water remained along 1200 West in the section, which extends south of 200 South. Slater, speaking from her home, expressed skepticism the issue is resolved.

“When it goes a whole year without (water), I’ll believe, because it’s been there all summer,” she said from her home.

The height of the warehouses, 45 feet, has been the biggest sore point for residents on the Marriott-Slaterville side of BDO because the structures block most residents’ view of the Wasatch Mountains to the east. But the standing water and blowing dust, particularly when warehouse construction was in full swing, are also concerns.

Wayne thanked Johnson for his response. “It’s the first time they’ve responded even though we’ve bugged them for a year,” he said.

But he think more work may be necessary — grading in the area where water accumulates so the moisture flows to the swamps. “Our frustration comes from the fact that Boyer spent all summer doing nothing about a well-known drainage problem. If the completion of the landscaping drags into the spring, we ask that Ogden city find a way to control the mosquito population on its BDO property, until the county starts its mosquito abatement season,” Wayne told Johnson in an emailed response.

Meantime, the raw feelings for many who live on the Marriott-Slaterville side of the BDO development persist. “If we weren’t as old as we are, we would leave,” Slater said.

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