So, the plumbing company has been here since 7:00 AM digging up the street to fix my leaking pipe. And I'm smiling right about now. A few years ago the city of New York did a massive sewer and main pipe replacement in our area. It snarled up traffic for about a year. In order to replace the main pipes they had to cut the pipes coming from the houses to the main in the street. And when they finished their work they had to reconnect all the house pipes to the main. Guess what they used to connect the two pieces of cut pipe with? Rubber. Yup a rubber connector. Just how long do you suppose a piece of rubber will last when it's buried in an area that has constant water and below freezing temperatures?
So joy, the leaky pipe is not our fault. The plumber and my hubby are out there taking pictures right now and getting a sample of the rubber. Now, instead of going after Verizon, whose fault it isn't, we get to go after the City for shoddy workmanship on its part, resulting in our having to pay money that we should not be paying. Hopefully we will manage to recoup the money in our lifetime--dealing with the City is not fun and not easy. And all our neighbors are not happy either; if they used rubber to reconnect our pipe they probably used rubber to reconnect all the pipes on the block if not the whole neighborhood. Want to bet that there will be more leaks found in the near future?
I called our local newspaper and they are sending a photographer to take pictures as well; they also believe that the rubber connector is not just a fluke occuring only on my pipe. You know the only people who are not running to come and take a look at the pipe? The water department. Hmmm, want to bet they knew what we were going to find before we found it? Got to love it--our tax dollars at work.
Late Breaking Addendum: Having now dug up about half the street, our plumbing crew just gave us the news: the fault for the rubber pipe fix could belong to the gas company, to Verizon or to the City. All three have fittings in the area where the faulty rubber was found. The plumber suggests we sue all three and let them work it out among themselves. And he warned us that we may never know who actually put in the rubber instead of the copper pipe that should have been there. Right now a one-room tent in the Rockies is looking idyllic.
2 comments:
Can you spell lawyer? Good luck to you on this!
Not sure about NY law, but under common law you're probably going to have a serious problem if you can't identify the responsible party. Unless there are special circumstances, usually you need to identify the defendant rather than have a group of defendants "sort it out."
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