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East Boston street fills with water, buckles after main bursts

Flooded street in East Boston

Ellie shows us Cottage Street in East Boston, where a 10-inch water main just couldn't take it anymore tonight.

UPDATE: Not long after Ellie took the above photo, Kevin Tremko photographed the car in front of the SUV, which now looks like it's not going anywhere anytime soon:

Sunken car in East Boston
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Comments

Are periodic breaks like this just to be expected, or are these incidents yet more examples of our aging infrastructure?

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A little of both, but mostly the aging infrastructure.

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Boston's water and sewer system is overall in good condition considering its age with occasional breaks like this but nothing on the scale seen in comparable, older East Coast cities. Philadelphia is averaging over one thousand breaks per fiscal year and the system there is crumbling. Baltimore's is in very tough shape too.

http://www.phillymag.com/citified/2015/06/15/water-main-break-philadelphia/

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I'm honestly amazed Boston is trying to fix the problem. When I lived in Houston I used to drive by at least 3 gushing water mains a day, for months on end, when we were on water restrictions due to drought.

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Never seen something that bad, but in Manchester, NH I saw a busted cap over a water main (one of these) at an intersection gushing water a few months back; I called the city and let them know about it and it wasn't replaced for over a week.

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