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Who owns the water service line in Kirkland, WA

Which part of the pipe is yours

  • Water service line

    Yours from the meter to your building — if certain conditions are met

    Why, and what to do
  • Sewer lateral

    Yours all the way to the main under the road — unless Northshore Utility District is your sewer provider

    Why, and what to do
your buildingproperty linesidewalkstreetmain
The thick length is yours. A dashed marker means the position depends on your property — see below.

If something’s wrong

Who to call first about the water service line

BelowGrid has no first-call guidance on file from Kirkland about the water service line.

The documents this answer is built on

Who is responsible for which part

In Kirkland the property owner maintains the water service pipe from the meter to the building. Section 15.16.070 of the Kirkland Municipal Code provides that "A water service pipe from the meter to the premises being served will be maintained by the property owner." The code does not say who maintains the pipe between the main and the meter. This is Kirkland's own statement.

The property owner
The water service pipe from the meter to the building.

What decides which applies

The pipe from the main to the meter is installed by a licensed contractor under a right-of-way use permit, or by the City, and the City installs the meter and meter box; no section read says who repairs that pipe afterwards, so ask the City before paying for work between the main and the meter. Where a meter is set a considerable distance from the main, the customer maintains the service pipe "for the entire distance from the normally designated location of the water meter to the point of ultimate usage or consumption." About 49% of Kirkland's land is inside the City's water service area as the Washington State Department of Health maps it, and this answer applies only inside that area. Other systems serve the rest under their own rules: Northshore Utility District about 41%, Woodinville Water District about 7% and the City of Redmond about 1.5%. Check the name on your water bill.

Sources

Kirkland Municipal Code section 15.16.070

Checked

What the pipe is made of

Washington publishes no statewide inventory of what service lines are made of. Each water system filed its own with the State, and federal rules require the utility to make it public, so the utility is the place to ask what is recorded for this address.

Kirkland: official site

What this page cannot tell you

  • This describes who is responsible for which part of the pipe. It is not a record of what your own service line is made of.
  • This answer applies inside the area the State maps for Kirkland's own water system, which does not follow the city limits: some addresses in the city are served by another supplier, and some outside it are served by the city. An address search checks which side an address is on.
  • This authority's service line inventory - the record of which pipes are lead, and where - has not been matched here yet. Ask the utility for yours.
Kirkland: official site

Your other pipe: the sewer lateral

For the sewer lateral, Kirkland says:

In Kirkland the property owner owns and maintains the whole side sewer, from the connection at the main to the building, including any stub the City put in. Section 15.28.135 of the Kirkland Municipal Code provides that "It shall be the responsibility of the property owner to own and maintain the side sewer from the connection at the main to the building."

Your sewer lateral is yours to the main; your water line stops being yours at the meter.

Same trench, separate authorities, decided separately.

Who pays for the sewer lateral in Kirkland, WA

Look up a specific address

This page describes what applies to properties in Kirkland in general. To see which authorities serve one address, and what records exist for it, search for it.

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