COLUMBIA, S.C. — Columbia's Rosewood community is at the center of a city project to overhaul aging water pipes, which is welcome news to its residents.
"We've had brown water in our sink and our showers and our toilet," Mack Ramage, a USC student and Rosewood resident, said.
For the past year, she's had issues with her water.
"There's been a couple cases where we've had to go to a Starbucks and stuff to go to the bathroom and stuff instead of doing it at our house," Ramage said.
According to Dana Higgins, director of engineering with the City of Columbia, this area is high-priority.
"We have aging infrastructure with our water systems throughout the city," Higgins said. "Using a heat map on complaints through customer care, we were able to determine that the Rosewood area, south of Rosewood down to about Airport Boulevard, has a large section, about 21 miles worth of infrastructure, that needs to be replaced."
The project started with the first phase in the fall of 2023 and will progress in multiple stages.
"The first phase is starting on the west side from South Gregg to Maple," she said. "The contractors you might see out on Rosewood or within that area, they're working on phase one."
Higgins said some things to expect during construction are parking and driveway access interruptions.
The Pickworth family is new to the area. While they haven't experienced water issues, the construction is impacting them.
"It's a little bothersome and covers up some of the street, but other than that, we like that it cuts down on the traffic," Emily Pickworth said.
Higgins said the second phase is in the drawing phase and will impact the area from Maple to South Ott Road. The city anticipates starting it this spring.
"They are completing the construction drawings now, so we will be able to go to construction, hopefully, this spring to summer," Higgins said.
Ramage says it's worth the wait.
"Definitely with cleaner and better water and not having to deal with brown water as often as we had, I'm completely fine with," Ramage said.
The project's third phase is estimated to start this fall and is expected to be finished in spring 2027.