The one house we had with the meter in the basement also had a shutoff valve in the front yard. A small brass (?) disk was over it.
When the inside shutoff valve started leaking we called a plumber to fix it. Required replacement. He also couldn’t shut it off from the yard. Had to call the water company, waited, got it turned off, etc. The pipe was buried deeply to avoid freezing and the tool had a quite long handle.
Our other places have had a meter in the front yard with a valve on the customer side of it. That’s consider “homeowner responsibility” territory so shutting that off myself is no issue.
I live in a warm climate, so pipes freezing is not an issue. The water meter and stopcock is in a box by the street. The meter is also the delineation between my property and the city’s property. There is a valve on both sides of the meter. I can easily operate both of them – waiting for the city to come out seems silly to me. I have the long-handled tool to turn the stopcock, but it’s only about twelve inches below the surface of the grass. I use it because it is sometimes difficult to turn the valve and, well, I don’t really want to stick my hand down in there. There be critters down there.
The stopcock has a collar around it with a hole. In the off position, the hole aligns with another hole on the supply pipe. A padlock can be placed through it to secure it from being opened without authorization. There is also a hole so that the valve can be locked in the open position, preventing some wisenheimer from coming along and turning off my water – not that that is really a problem.
In Little Rock, there is a seal wired to the water company’s side of the valve where water enters the meter. Any leaks on that side are their problem, leaks on the valve that leaves the meter are the owner’s problem. The demarcation point, if you will.
One thing that hasn’t been mentioned is that in some cases (like in my town) the shutoff valve at the street that they use the 3-foot t-handle on has a pentagonal nut. This deters the average person because while you can get the t-handle for $30-40 it’s far, far easier to just pay the bill, not to mention the legal action sure to come if you do turn it back on.
They use the penta nut around here, and the shut off is in the street. The town is the water utility and it would take years of non-payment of the water bill and probably property taxes also before they’d ever turn it off. It’s just the way we don’t do things in these parts.
I’ve lived with a number of different systems. Since I haven’t lived in a freezing area since I was 3, none of the valves were very far underground.
At present, I don’t think I’ve got an underground valve at all (due to cheapness)… There may be a valve actually on the main, but I wouldn’t bet on it. If the water company wants to shut off my water, they come and put a padlock on the valve on their side of the meter in my front yard. If they need to replace the meter, they shut off at the same place. If they need to replace their valve, they freeze the water pipe below the valve, using a special liquid-gss dohicky that wraps around the water pipe.
I purchased a new home a few months ago and the water had been turned off. I got there on the weekend, so no water employees available. I just turned the water on and helped myself. I called the water company on Monday to have the service turned on “officially” and even went to the box and turned it off. The employees came out, left me a note that the water was now on, but never actually did turn the water on. So I did it myself again, and everything has been cool since. I get a bill and I pay it.
You have to have a valve on the main (the corporation stop) in order to tap the main in the first place. Water services are usually live-tapped using a tapping machine that drills into the water main and screws in a threaded fitting with a valve that is shut. This is the corporation stop. The water service line is then connected up to the curb stop (which is also shut). Once the connection to the curb stop is made, you can open the corporation stop and backfill the excavation in the street. You then complete the installation to the house, flush the line, and connect up to the water meter and open all of the valves.
Melbourne, I’d be surprised if there isn’t an underground valve at the property line that is accessible from the surface (the curb stop). That said, one issue with many of these valves is that they are often many decades old, and often break when operated. Your utility may use the freeze method to avoid operating (and possibly breaking) the curb stops.
My utility does not use the freeze method. Instead, we simply replace the curb stops when they break.
This whole thread reminded me of my - uh - less solvent days back in college, when it was not at all unusual for me to receive “overdue” and “final” notices. On day I was looking out the front window, and saw some city worker messing around on the front yard with a t-handle. Wasn’t sure what he was doing. Until I flushed the toilet … :smack:
I’m supposing this is some kind of city thing. I’ve never lived in a city, out here in the burbs and exurbs water doesn’t get turned off easily for non-payment. It’s not that much money and somebody owns the property and will be responsible for the bill. Eventually they’ll need something from the town and pay it or their property will be taken to cover the debt when it gets high enough. I could see it happening where water is expensive I guess.
I do understand in a college town turning off the water might be a good idea in case someone decides to turn the basement into an indoor swimming pool.
On an episode of Bob Vila’s post-TOH show they did this for a home in Chicago that needed a new line from the main. I thought “No way can they hook up a new line on a pressurized main.”
And they then proceeded to do that. It’s fun to watch.
Tx. I knew they did this but never got to see it happening. It’s needed a lot when new houses are built in old neighborhoods. A contractor told me it’s preferred because old valves may not shut easily or may not open again easily after they’re shut (or maybe he just had the tool and preferred they hired him to do it).
A great job, handing things down to the guy ass deep in muddy water, who is actually working. I wonder how much Bob’s questions and play by play annoyed him.
I was surprised to find the water meter for my house in suburban Chicago was just in a small manhole about 10’ from the street. The lid for this manhole was maybe 14 to 16 inches in diameter, and the meter dial looked like an old car odometer. There was a metal flap to protect the glass over the dial, but that was propped up so the glass was covered with dirt and mud. This was some 20 years ago now, but I think it was too far down to actually touch (so I had to use a stick to try to clear away some of the muck) but it wasn’t so far down I couldn’t read the numbers. I don’t remember seeing shutoff valves but I’m sure they were in there too. I was just surprised to find it in this empty void, and that it never froze.
That is the way I have seen them in North/Little Rock. The shut off valve is a bar you turn with a large crescent wrench. I am surprised at it being so close to the surface in Chicago.