Water Drainage Issues At Cookeville Fire Main

The Cookeville Fire Department continues to search for answers to an outdated drainage system around City Hall.

Because the station is located under city hall, which has stood for over 50 years, flooding has become more of an issue. City Manager James Mills said last week crews did some exploratory work to see what might be causing some of the periodic issues.

“The building drainage for the front of the building cuts across in front of the fire department,” Mills said. “What we were doing was running a camera up the existing drain pipe to determine if there was a blockage there. Turned out most of that pipe, or a large portion of the pipe that was there had either collapsed or wasn’t functioning.”

The damaged pipe was dug out and replaced. Mills said more work will be done to determine if there are other issues causing water to backup into the fire station. Mills said few improvements have been made to the drainage system over the years.

“We’ve been in this building for quite a while,” Mills said. “We need to take care of it, so that’s what we’re trying to do. See what the problem is and see if we can get it fixed.”