Senator Pat Jehlen sponsored a $5 million “Alewife Brook CSOs” Amendment to the State’s Environmental Bond Bill, called “An Act to Build Resilience for Massachusetts Communities.”
Our hope is that money is spent on developing the Alewife Brook Community Sewage Elimination Plan. Let’s also invest in Green Stormwater Infrastructure on DCR parkland, to support complete sewer separation in the cities of Cambridge and Somerville at Alewife Brook.
MWRA, Cambridge and Somerville are proposing a plan at Alewife Brook which only includes .1% sewer separation. Because the plan includes only .1% sewer separation, the Alewife plan will result in greater amounts of sewage pollution in the future due to Climate Change. A single 5-year storm (one that happens once in 5 years) will result in 15 million gallons of raw sewage dumped in the Brook – and that’s after the $340 million plan is constructed.
The Climate Resilient strategy is sewer separation and green stormwater infrastructure, not undersized storage. Without sewer separation, the problem is going to be many times worse in larger storms.
Sewer separation removes large volumes of stormwater from the regional and local sewer system. Sewer separation increases local and regional sewer system capacity, reducing CSOs, SSOs, basement backups, and flooding. It’s a win-win-win-win-win!
click on image to download Community Plan