As cities grew in size and density during the Industrial Revolution, they all had to build more, and better, sewers. The cholera epidemic wasn't motivation enough for London, but the "Great Stink" of 1858, when the Thames smelled so bad that Parliament considered relocating, got the city government's attention; it built new sewers in the 1850s and '60s to carry waste downstream from central London. Brooklyn introduced sewers in 1857, and Chicago not long after. Boston, still largely building sewers privately, had about 100 miles of sewers in 1869; by 1885 that had expanded to 226 miles, and new houses were expected to connect to the system both for pump and washbasin waste and for the human waste now going into flush toilets instead of privies.
Every city had its own problems and its own characteristics. Some of Boston's sewers had outfalls dammed by the tide 12 hours of every 24; others, built by unscrupulous contractors in land reclamation projects like the Back Bay, sagged and lost their downhill slope, causing settling, clogs, and backups. Sylvan Seattle had pipes made of wooden staves--and faced a tide problem so severe that at certain times of day toilets became foul geysers; eventually the city simply rebuilt itself higher than its sewer pipes. In Chicago, the outfalls of the sewers made such a mess of Lake Michigan that during large rainstorms the plume of tainted water flowed all the way out to the intake for the water system. In response, engineers built a series of canals and reversed the flow of the Chicago River, turning it from a drainage into Lake Michigan into a flow from Lake Michigan toward the Mississippi. They also moved the intake farther out into the lake.
All these "solutions" merely moved the problem. As one historian said in describing Boston's covering a brook filled with sewage and routing it to the Charles River rather than directly into Boston Harbor, this "somewhat lessened the nuisance caused by it, or at least transferred it to another locality." Older cities on the coasts built combined systems channeling both sewage and stormwater, whereas newer and smaller cities built separate systems--both storm drains and systems of much smaller pipes that handled only sewage--thus preventing sewage overflows in storms. Lennox, Massachusetts, built the first such system in 1875, and Memphis built one in 1880. Since then, that's what everybody has built.
Raleigh laid its first sewer pipes in 1890. Fayetteville Street, Raleigh's main road, wasn't paved until 1886, at exactly the same time the first water pipes were being laid; where water pipes go, sewer pipes soon follow. The privies of Raleigh's population of barely 10,000 almost certainly had not yet polluted the soil enough to foul its wells, and the new sewer pipes, running north to Crabtree Creek and south to Walnut Creek, would not have discharged more than the streams could absorb. (A stream running at about 6 cubic feet per second can absorb the waste of about 1,000 people, so to support 10,000 people the two creeks together would have had to flow at around 60 cfs. Currently, on a dry day in a dry month, they flow at about 75 cfs.) Now, with 2,300 miles of pipes all heading roughly southeast to Raleigh's wastewater treatment plant, the sewer collection system turns out to be the only infrastructure stream that follows that natural tree pattern that I'd expected to find everywhere. The leaves are houses, connected by 4-inch service lines to 6- or 8-inch mains that run mostly beneath streets, and then to 18-, 24-, or 30-inch collectors that start out along streets but head downhill to creek basins, leading to larger and larger pipes and finally to the plant. I sat down with a friendly GIS expert to check it out.
The GIS map easily showed me the path of my own wastewater: the 4-inch lateral in my yard--the same pipe that "flushable" wipe clogged--runs into an 8-inch main, which heads downhill along my street until it crosses the Pigeon House Branch, down by the pool I like to sit by. It runs along the Pigeon House until it joins a 24-inch PVC east of town (the path is following rivers by then, not roads), and thereafter joins larger and larger pipes--some made of PVC, some of reinforced concrete, some of ductile iron. Eventually this stream hits the dual 72-inch reinforced concrete pipes that head directly to the sewer plant, though those sometimes separate into three or four pipes, for ease of maintenance. It's simple and, especially after the spaghetti tangle of the water lines, rather satisfying. It's much like the stormwater system, if every ravine in every drainage basin remained piped and they all came together in one place before entering the Neuse.
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16 Comments
Add CommentExcellent article, kudos to SA for reprinting it. I've been studying water and wastewater treatment with an eye toward employment. The more I learn, the more impressed and fascinated I am by the ingenuity that had made WWTPs amazingly efficient and virtually smell-free, producing very clean water. It's unfortunate that most people can't or won't ever visit one of these high tech plants to see how much they aren't like you'd expect, and how sensible it is to re-use tertiary treated water.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRecycled water is the only thing that makes sense in a space colony. Of course, you could reduce all the water in sewage to hydrogen and oxygen, then burn it, if you have enough energy. I'm always looking for alternative concepts. Got ideas?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExcellent article, with information that should be, but is generally not, understood by citizens. Many still protest the fees they must pay for wastewater treatment as part of their utility bill. I hope this lengthy article can be condensed into newspaper features and municipal handouts to better educate citizens about a vital service. The city of Arcata, CA, has a very interesting wastewater treatment system that may warrant the attention of the author and readers. Link: http://www.cityofarcata.org/departments/environmental-services/water-wastewater/wildlife-sanctuary
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisone of the best articles i've read in along time....contained both historic and current detail...thanks Scott for your effort...this should be one of the main articles in sciam...not just a link to the side...then again 11 pages might be to much for most;-)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe four letter word for this stuff is actually an old acronym from the days of sail. When guano (bird droppings) was discovered in huge quantities on pacific islands and transported back in bales in the cargo holds of wooden sailing ships, any stored in the very bottom would get wet, give off methane gas which would be ignited by any sailor with a candle doing inspections. Several ships were lost before survivors told of huge explosions and fires that happened during inspections and the problem and mystery was resolved. Thereafter, maritime laws required all guano bales be marked "Store High In Transit".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisQuestion; Does it make sense to pump city water from wells (from the aquifer) use it, treat it, and dump it in the river-shed?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA rural home pumps from a residential well, uses it, treats it and returns it to the ground. Not a river headed for the Gulf of Oil.
I agree wholeheartedly with several others here that this was a fascinating and well-written article. Who knew sewage treatment could be so interesting?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA well written story on the history of used water distribution and treatment around the world. Ending off with a a fine and entertaining write up on the process of water reclamation. I love the point which says that what the used water treatment plant is doing is in fact mimicking what the river is doing, just quicker!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisA well written story on the history of used water distribution and treatment around the world. Ending off with a a fine and entertaining write up on the process of water reclamation. I love the point which says that what the used water treatment plant is doing is in fact mimicking what the river is doing, just quicker!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is hogwash, or perhaps a good example of the word it purports to define. See the Etymology section of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shit, which shows the origins going back to Roman times.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis text was meant to reply to the comment on the origin of the s-word, not a comment on the article or reply to any of the other comments:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is hogwash, or perhaps a good example of the word it purports to define. See the Etymology section of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shit, which shows the origins going back to Roman times.
The article itself was wonderful, a fascinating read, with a mind-boggling amount of information I could hardly wrap my mind around (though Mr. Huler's style certainly was as clear as . . . triple-treated waste water!).
I live in flat Phoenix and I'm really wanting now to know how our system works. And all the other infrastructure we ignore but wouldn't want to be without these days.
Thanks for the kind words; mm, you beat me to the punch on the etymology. And in answer to Quinn, no, I don't think that makes sense; surface water -- like water from a reservoir -- basically just makes its way to the ocean through the city and its residents. That's where it was going anyhow, so wastewater generated by a community with surface water as its source can reasonably be released back into the stormwater system -- the riverbasin from which it emerged.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAquifer water is on the same journey, but it may take much longer, and continued pumping from an aquifer can deplete it; using septic systems to replace wastewater from such systems into the aquifer is probably a wiser move. Just the same, in my experience most houses on pumps -- using aquifer water -- are also using septic systems too, so the wastewater just trickles back into the ground.
There's a long chapter in "On the Grid" about stormwater -- much current stormwater treatment is about keeping it where it lands and helping it soak into the earth, instead of using curb and gutter to sluice it into creeks. It has a job to do as part of the hydrological cycle, and we do ourselves and the planet no favors by getting rid of it so quickly.
Many sewerage treatment stations only work at around 15% efficiency, because the operators cut the electricity supply to aerators and turbines to reduce expenses. The liquids that are then put into rivers are therefore a serious cause of pollution.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPyrolysing sewerage is a new, simpler and cheaper technique that should totally replace traditional plant. See www.eprida.com for more details.
How sewage treatment works in this country is so complicated! Why all the bother?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThey've got it figured out in Kibera; who needs sewers? Just poo in a bag and throw it in the street!
Thank you for this article; it has been a wonder to me that we honor or police and firefighters (rightfully so) but never give a second thought about those water and wastewater professionals who also keep us safe and healthy day in and day out. This too is a dangerious profession, there are more people who die in water/wastewater industry than in the police/fire profession. Again, kudos, keep up the good work.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@cwclark: I did not know that -- do you have a source for that statistic? It's important and I will share it. Thanks for your kind words.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScott