Major sewer project starts to clean Indy's waterways

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) - An eight-mile tunnel under the south side of Indianapolis that promises to clean up Indianapolis waterways is under way.

It's a small spot near Southport Road and Tibbs Avenue on the south side of the city right now. But in five years, it will be the first of five tunnels that will make up a complex underground sewage storage system. The entire project is expected to be finished by 2025, said Carey Lykins, president and CEO of Citizens Energy Group.

"Any time any significant rainfall occurs, even as little as a quarter of an inch, we're putting raw sewage in the White River and Fall Creek - conditions that we can't tolerate," he said.

The deep rock tunnel connector will run for eight miles, 250 feet underground, wrapped in concrete. By fall, a special tunnel-boring machine will be brought in to begin the tough digging into the bedrock below. The tunnel will hold city sewage until rain ends and the sewage treatment plant can handle the waste.

That should make Indianapolis waterways much more attractive for recreation and development, said Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard.

"It's going to be a lot cleaner. We're going to reconnect to our waterways initiative. It's going to put a lot more activities at or near the waterway. That's the intent,” Ballard said, “so that we can really use it as an economic development asset. We'll have to see how all that develops."

The tunnel project is not an option. The city agreed to it in a settlement with the EPA and the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. The first tunnel will cost about $180 million, and the entire project $1.6 billion.

Citizens Water customers will pay the bill.

"We've got to get raw sewage out of our rivers and streams, and that means higher sewer bills,” Lykins said. “We are going to hold those sewer bills down as much as we are able, but bills will go up."

How much is not yet known. But the project has been re-engineered since the original plan two years ago, and the city said the savings will be about $800 million dollars, which means smaller increases than were first anticipated.

Because the digging will be 250 feet below ground, you should not feel nor be affected by the construction.

One other note: Citizens Energy said customers’ bills will be changing this fall. Monthly meter readings, weather permitting, will take the place of every-other-month estimates. Water, sewer and gas will also be combined into one monthly bill.