WENATCHEE — City crews are patching up and cleaning up after a 3 a.m. water main break Thursday left hotels and businesses without water along a part of North Wenatchee Avenue.

Work today will square up the gigantic hole they had to dig along the southbound avenue between Seventh and Ninth streets to repair both the cracked water main and a section of parallel stormwater pipe that crews accidentally broke while digging.

The southbound lanes between Seventh and Ninth streets remain closed, likely until this afternoon. Northbound lanes opened Thursday at 8:30 p.m.

Dan Frazier, the city’s director of public works operations, said crews will fill the hole with fine compacted gravel, which gets harder in cold temperatures.

It’s a temporary fix, he said, but one that will likely be in place until temperatures warm and asphalt plants, which close for the winter, begin production.

Crews will inspect the repair daily and add more gravel, as needed, he said.

Rushing water from the ruptured pipe also caused the asphalt to dip in the route’s northbound lanes, Frazier said, but it’ll hold up to traffic until crews can fix it in warmer weather.

It remains unknown what caused a more than six-foot-long crack to form in the pipe, which dates to the late 1950s, but was expected to have a lifespan of 100 years or more.

Frazier said a gas line in the area could speed up deterioration of a cast-iron pipe, as could soil conditions.

The rupture site is about eight feet from a similar rupture that crews repaired in 2006.

The city will take a closer look at the area and could decide to replace more pipe from Ninth Street south before they permanently repair the road and repave, he said.

“If we’re going to come in and overlay this road, we don’t want to come in in two years and dig it up,” he said.

Frazier said the city’s road-repair budget, fed by user utility fees, is well funded despite the city’s Town Toyota Center-fueled budget woes.

City night crews finished removing snow berms on Chelan Avenue and Mission Street last night and part of Wenatchee Avenue.

Frazier said they’ll get whatever is left Sunday night, and could start plowing some side streets today, depending on how the repair works goes on the north avenue.