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Q.Coming south on Falls of Neuse, just past St Raphael's Catholic Church, there is some major construction going on down the first residential street on the right. Lots of big equipment and some major culverts -- what's up with that??

-- Tim Humphrey

A.The street you are referring to is Fairfax Drive, off Falls of Neuse between Millbrook and Spring Forest Roads. According to Robert Kirkpatrick, project engineer for the City of Raleigh, a stormwater project is being done on this residential road.

The city pays 100 percent for repairs of structural or street flooding, Kirkpatrick said. In this case, Fairfax Drive, as well as one of the residences on the street, were experiencing flooding during rains.

"We're upsizing the system to meet the 100-year storm," he said.

When the subdivision was originally built, Kirkpatrick said, it may not have been within the city limits. There were also different criteria used then for stormwater drainage.

This project involves removing an 18-inch stormwater pipe and replacing it with a 48-inch pipe.

"This pipe will do a great deal to alleviate the previous problem," he said, noting that it is a much more robust stormwater system.

In order to replace the pipe, workers had to dig up Fairfax Drive. Kirkpatrick said they had to preserve the old system while putting the new system in place.

Kirkpatrick said he hopes to be done in the next few weeks. All of the pipe is installed; the curb and gutter are in and Fairfax should be ready to be paved in the next week or so. After that, they will seed the grass and plant trees over the disturbed area.