Officials: Dickinson water depot use to ease

• Water Depot

Dickinson's water depot pictured Tuesday in Dickinson.

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A steady parade of water tankers could soon be diverted from a depot in the middle of town to a location east of Dickinson.

During a presentation to the Southwest Water Authority Board of Directors at the Elk’s Lodge on Tuesday, Dickinson City Administrator Shawn Kessel said it’s the city’s intention to cut back or end its operation of a water depot used mostly for oil industry-related purposes on West Broadway adjacent to the railroad tracks.

“We don’t want that depot to be used anymore,” Kessel told the board. “We want to push water traffic to the (SWA) depot on the east side of town. We really want to get the trucks out of our midtown.”

Board member Steve Schneider of Dickinson inquired about the shutting down of the water depot while SWA CEO Mary Massad said the depot east of town was operational and ready to take on more customers. Kessel said the city has preliminary plans — although he stressed nothing has been finalized — to put a new water vending facility just west of Dickinson, possibly near where a new exit off Interstate 94 would be constructed.

“The idea is to keep the trucks out of Dickinson,” Kessel said. “We’d really like to see those big 16-wheelers stay on the interstate if we can. We don’t have a timeline so we could move on this sooner than later because there’s another resource close by.”

Although nothing was agreed upon Tuesday, Kessel said the city could either shut the facility down or raise rates as an incentive for customers to use the other depot, just off 36th Street Southwest near Roughrider RVs.

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