Construction of the Sewer System

1800-1900

The City of Milwaukee began construction of a public sewer system more then 130 years ago, to carry wastewater to the area rivers and to Lake Michigan. This design was insufficient for numerous reasons: the population of the area was too great, the waters smelled horribly, and there were fears of disease and contaminated drinking water. In 1888, the government took the approach of diluting the polluted waters with clean water from Lake Michigan. They built a flushing tunnel, which pumped water from Lake Michigan into the stagnant Milwaukee River, just below the North Avenue Dam. In 1907, a similar pumping tunnel was constructed in the Kinnickinnic River.

To help relieve the odor that was being noticed in the lower portions of the Milwaukee River, the city decided to construct a flushing tunnel. This tunnel would allow the pumping of water from Lake Michigan to be diverted to the lower river. However, this unfortunately brought about the possibility of diseases such as cholera and typhoid entering the drinking water. To help alleviate these problems, city officials approved the installation of pumping stations and streets mains in 1887. This provided chlorine-treated Lake Michigan drinking water for the city residents.

With a typhoid scare in 1909, the formation of the Sewerage Commission of the City of Milwaukee was created in 1913. Their job was to design and build a complete treatment and disposal system for the city's waste. The Commission was one of the first in the nation to support secondary wastewater treatment. Built in 1925, the Jones Island Wastewater Treatment Plant used the activated sludge method (using microorganisms to feed on the pollutants).

As the population of the area continued to grow, so did the area's sewerage system. Additional treatment plants and sewer lines were built. By 1977, work began on planning and constructing Milwaukee's Deep Tunnel system. This system of over 17 miles of tunnels, 300 feet below ground, is the corner stone of the Milwaukee Water Pollution Abatement Program, designed to trap sewer overflows.

Construction Of The Sewer System

1900-Present

By the 1900’s the city of Milwaukee was still having major problems with possible contamination of drinking water due to sewage. To help with the disposal of sewage so that it wouldn’t enter the drinking water, the city of Milwaukee built the first water treatment plant in the country. Jones Island Water Treatment was completed in 1925. The goal of this plant was to take sewage that was discharge previously into Lake Michigan was now brought through the plant and treated. This resulted in cleaner water and less contamination of Lake Michigan.

As the city of Milwaukee continued to grow, there was a major increase in wastewater volume. This led to the formation of a suburban Sewage Commission in 1921 to help monitor the flow of the wastewater. The commission decided that since there was an increase in wastewater that a second plant was needed. In 1968 the South Shore Wastewater Plant was opened in the City of Oak Creek.

In 1972 to compile with the Clean Water Act MMSD (Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewage District) launched work on a facility plan to upgrade treatment systems in order to meet the new regulatory requirements. In 1977 the Milwaukee Pollution Abatement Program was created to begin repair and expand the entire metropolitan area wastewater conveyance and treatment system. Soon after this was created, works begin on the planning and the construction of the Milwaukee’s Deep Tunnel System.

The Deep Tunnel System consisted over 17 miles of Deep Tunnels dug 300 feet underground that would trap sewer overflows. They felt that this would be the best solution to over flow problems because it would store excess wastewater until it could be treated and then it would convey the wastewater to the treatment plant.

The tunnel took 9 years to build and is a straightforward design concept that combines horizontal and vertical circular shaft constructions. In the year 2000, the Deep Tunnel System prevented 32 overflows and captured more then 6.6 billion gallons of untreated wastewater. (For more information, please see MMSD’s website at www.mmsd.com/tunnelfactsheet.html)