West Michigan Park is a beautiful historic cottage development along Lake Michigan, north of Lake Macatawa, in Ottawa County, Michigan. This cottage development was partially constructed on the face of a steep-sloping dune, which limits access to non-motorized travel along sidewalks and elevated boardwalks. Cottage owners approached Holland Engineering about designing a fire protection system that would reduce the response time for fire fighters and improve reliability of pressurized water supply in the event of fire within the development.
Two of HEI Civil Infrastructure staff members serve as paid on-call fire fighters and welcomed the challenge of designing a unique fire protection system for West Michigan Park.
HEI worked with representatives of Park Township, West Michigan Park Association, Ottawa County Parks and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment to design a "dry" fire protection system which would be employed only during a fire event. The project includes constructing a 6-inch fire line from the Association's parking lot into the cottage development with 4-inch service lines extended to stand pipes which are nominally spaced at 200 feet or less. During a fire event, Park Township Fire Department will use truck-mounted pumping equipment to supply and pressurize the normally-dry fire system from the parking lot, while at the same time fire fighters on foot, with prepackaged hoses and nozzles, will potentially traverse 1/4 mile of boardwalk to the nearest stand pipe and set up fire suppression operations.