WOBURN - Reports of continuing progress on several fronts, and success already in two areas, helped make this week's quarterly City Council Water Committee meeting a relatively short and mostly cordial affair.

With the crowds dwindling as many of the more serious water issues have been addressed, the Water Committee is still holding meetings to make sure the city keep's moving forward in its effort to offer clean water to all residents.

"I feel since we made a commitment to address the problem there has been substantial progress made working as a team," Mayor Thomas McLaughlin said at the outset of the meeting.

Jean Monahan-Doherty, Arlington Street, one of many residents who showed up at the original meetings just over a year ago with jugs of brown water pulled from their taps, credited the city for the progress made to date.

"I really feel hopeful," she said. "For the first time in many years."

However, she asked the city to remain committed to improving water quality and not allowing the problems of the past to return.

Discussions at the quarterly meetings have centered around three areas:

- addressing immediate problems, particularly in the South End.

- finding a filtration system to reduce the amount of manganese and iron at the source (the Horn Pond pumping station);

- and to study the entire system to update the city on a short- and long-term capital improvement plan for the city on its water system.

DPW Supt. Frederick Russell commented on the work to improve water quality in the South End including additional flushing as well as cleaning and re-lining of the pipes in the area including but not limited to Arlington Street, Belmont Street, Cross Street and Border Road.

As well, he noted, work is now complete on water looping through the Cross Street area, designed to improve water quality by reducing the amount of time it sits stagnant.

"The boys did a fine job on the water looping project," commented Ward 2 Alderman Richard Gately. Gately noted there were some reports of increased chlorine shortly after the work was completed but he noted it quickly disappeared.

The second phase includes removing iron and manganese at the source by adding a filtration system at the Horn Pond pumping station. Two types of filters, media and membrane, are now under review.

Carol Rego and Jennifer Osgood from the firm of Camp Dresser McKee, the city's water consultant, outlined testing on six different units in place at the Horn Pond pumping station.

All have shown to greatly reduce the amounts of manganese and iron from the water though more testing will be done to determine over the long haul which unit will do the best job for the city relative to the long-term costs (cleaning and upkeep).

The testing began in early October with some of the filters taking up to three months to complete testing. A final report will go both to the city and to the state's DEP for final review.

Manganese and iron, though natural to the groundwater in the Horn Pond basin, have been determined to be a source of some of the discolored water, though not a health threat, according to officials.

In one case, at Well C, the six filters tested all took the amount of manganese coming out of the source from 40 milligrams per litter to under 5 milligrams.

Rego noted that while manganese and iron are the focal point, that many other natural elements will also be removed which will help water quality. The amounts of removal for these other elements will also be factored into the final decision.

Finally, Rego and Osgood updated the council on CDM's water distribution system study for the city looking at everything from the miles of pipes, to its pumping stations and tanks.

Everything from individual complaints to overall system liabilities are being reviewed.

Annual maintenance (flushing and cleaning of tanks) as well as a five-year plan for cleaning and relining pipes (at a cost of about $1m to 1.5m a year) and work on the city's holding tanks (with replacement of the Rag Rock tank) is being reviewed.

A preliminary list has been compiled with more review needed before a final plan is handed over to the city.

Present at last night's City Council's Water Committee meeting were members of the newly formed Woburn Advisory Committee, including chair Charles Viola.

Viola requested the advisory committee receive copies of many of the documents discussed at this week's meeting to stay up on the key issues.

Following the hour-long hearing, the City Council's Water Committee voted to establish the next meeting for Monday, Feb. 26, 2007.