Pennvest on Wednesday approved a total of $7.8 million in low-interest loans for two Blair County water system projects.

It approved $5.7 million for Tyrone Borough to replace 11,000 feet of waterline, renovate a distribution tank and booster pumping station and install a chlorine booster.

Pennvest also approved $2.1 million for the Altoona Water Authority to replace 6,500 feet of waterline.

In Tyrone, workers will replace old pipes whose walls are thinning faster than expected — a 10-inch line along 15th Street from Reservoir Drive to Lincoln Avenue and two 12-inch lines along Pennsylvania Avenue from 10th to 16th streets, according to consulting engineer Kevin Nester of GHD in Huntingdon.

Workers in Tyrone will also renovate the 1970s distribution tank and booster pumping station at 23rd Street and install the chlorine booster station along Business Route 220 north of town near Rays Burial Vault Co. to ensure adequate chlorine concentrations from that point to the Vail Industrial Park.

Construction should begin this summer and take about nine months, Nester estimated.

The loan should cover the entire project, he said.

The interest on the 20-year loan is 1.1 percent for the first five years and 1.8 percent for the remainder, according to a news release from state Rep. Jim Gregory, R-Hollidaysburg.

In Altoona, workers will replace a Class 50 cast iron waterline where there have been frequent breaks between Logan Boulevard and California Avenue with stronger ductile iron pipe that has an exterior coating of zinc, according to authority officials, including General Manager Mark Perry.

The authority is replacing the old pipe prior to Penn­DOT’s reconstruction of the route, which runs on Arlaryd Street, Orchard Avenue, Goods Lane, Rhode Island Avenue and 58th Street.

“The last thing we wanted to see was them overhauling the road, then we have a main rupture,” Perry said. “It’s definitely in our best interest to replace it.”

As the authority completes a section of piping, the department will begin rebuilding the road there, Perry said.

The piping work, which will be done by contract, will begin in the spring and take three months, Perry predicted.

Some of the work is likely to be done at night, to alleviate the inconvenience for motorists along the busy route, Perry said.

The loan should cover the entire cost of the project, Perry said.

The interest on the 20-year loan is 1 percent for the first five years and 1.7 percent for the remainder, according to a news release from state Rep. Lou Schmitt, R-Altoona, and state Sen. Judy Ward, R-Blair.

Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 949-7038.