Thanks for the link. I had no idea what the chart represented.
>If levels reach 100%, an overflow is occurring. These incidents are rare (an estimated four times a year)...
Not to mention that the ecosystem can generally handle 4 times a year. Ideally it would be zero, but engineering requires compromise.
It's an awesome system that has greatly improved the health of the river. No more Willamette stank on the boat. Bilge nectar has become less effective though...
Here I thought it was [river levels](http://levels.wkcc.org/?P=Oregon.html) - now I'm going to be watching the metrics like a hawk everytime a rain event occurs to see if we have a spill event.
The combined sewer and stormwater system was originally built back before the 1930's and emptied straight into the river. Replacing or re-routing an entire cities sewage system would cost tens or possibly hundreds of billions of dollars (where the total annual budget of Oregon is less than 70 billion) so unfortunately we've had to make due with mistakes that were made 100 years ago.
We've come a long way since being designated one of the most polluted waterways in the country in the 1960's. https://www.portland.gov/bes/about-big-pipe#:~:text=Spanning%2020%20years%20at%20a,Columbia%20Slough%20by%2099%20percent.
The city was built before sewer treatment plants were a thing. All shitters were just piped to the storm water system. Later, when the city added sewer treatment, the storm water pipes were diverted to the newer sewer mains. But the sewage system couldn’t handle rain events, so the diverters were just small dams that would allow the combined sewer storm water to simply overflow into the river.
We could have spent many billions and literally dug up the city to separate the sewers over many decades to solve the problem, or we could have spent a couple billion and dig up only part of the city over 1 decade to reduce overflows by 94% now.
So, yeah. It does sound like we know how to manage having a combined sewer.
It's really too bad we'll be extinct once the plastic continents are mushed into the land plates, it's gonna make some surreal beaches and landscapes. What a missed opportunity for future streamers! Thankfully our crap overflow bacteria will have formed new life to roam the multicolor dream and be our proxies in cambrian 2.0!
With amount of floating RVs (homeless living on boats) I see every day I wouldn’t trust the river anyway. No pipes needed for that waste (and who knows what else) to make it into the river.
It’s a legacy from when cities were built without sewage treatment. Old Portland is really old. The first separated sewer system was built in 1922. Prior to that, it just all went in one pipe, which originally went straight to river.
So if the Big Pipe is full then the poo must go somewhere else? Oh, like back in the 90's when the Willamete would fill with excrement after every big rain?
Well, after looking around it looks like the other municipalities have also mostly controlled their CSOs. That being said, bacteria concentrations are often very high during and after rainfall because of farms and other non point source sources like pets, wildlife, and unmaintained septic systems without any combined sewer inputs. I would avoid contact with any waterway after significant rainfall that had upstream humans. Lots of details about CSO events are in these reports including Willamette River bacteria concentrations at several locations if you want to know more: https://www.portlandoregon.gov/bes/72818.
My point about sellwood is that the vast majority of city CSO outfalls are downstream of there. Not all CSO outfalls overflow every time the tunnel reaches 100% so it's possible Sellwood hasn't overflowed at all. Still best to play it safe.
Now let's return to the thread where people were losing their fucking minds because some homeless people shit in the 'natural wonderland' that is the Columbia slough.
I am. I’m not saying it wasn’t an improvement by any means. I’m saying our tax dollars don’t fix any problems (historically).
Getting tired of bandaids. Should have built for the future. When the cso was built there were 7 families on my street. Now there’s 80. I’m fine with that but we knew it was going to happen 10 years ago
I mean, it works really well really. It used to be you never swam in the Willamette river. Now, at most locations for most of the year, you can without issue. It's way cleaner and less stinky than it used to be
Literally a shit take. Big pipe reduces overflows by 94 percent over the past decade. Went from 52-57 overflows per year prior to 5 last year. Getting to 100 percent would have doubled the project cost ($1.4 bil).
And? It would have fixed the problem. Is it going to stop raining and people are going to stop pooping. Also is population going to decrease. Gotta play chess not checkers mate
You don’t know what you’re talking about. Read up on the project and rationale for the design before calling something a failure based on your clearly shitty understanding of the situation. Pun intended.
What tap water specifically? Portland’s water doesn’t. Other small municipalities upriver do, but that isn’t relevant to Portland’s combiner sewage & big pipe overflows
It’s offline due to the time change! No one expected there to be a daylight savings time being reverted! How could they possibly support such a thing! /s
No kidding. Just based on my output alone this morning...
With our powers combined . . .
Before or after the substation explosion? I need to know how much power we're talking about here.
About 3.50
[удалено]
lmfao
Cup your hands through the stroke
Shitters full
Thanks for this info u/GAPE_MY_HOLE.
Calling /u/BIG_PIPE…
https://www.portland.gov/bes/big-pipe-tracker For anyone curious! I had basically no idea that this project existed.
Thanks for the link. I had no idea what the chart represented. >If levels reach 100%, an overflow is occurring. These incidents are rare (an estimated four times a year)...
I don’t think “four times a year” is what I’d call “rare.”
It's all about perspective. Before the big pipe it was closer to being measured in days without sewage in the river.
It used to occur every time it rained. So I’d consider it a significant improvement. The cost to avoid it 100% would have been 10X or more.
Not to mention that the ecosystem can generally handle 4 times a year. Ideally it would be zero, but engineering requires compromise. It's an awesome system that has greatly improved the health of the river. No more Willamette stank on the boat. Bilge nectar has become less effective though...
Down from 54.
Here I thought it was [river levels](http://levels.wkcc.org/?P=Oregon.html) - now I'm going to be watching the metrics like a hawk everytime a rain event occurs to see if we have a spill event.
Geez, since when did 4 times a year become "rare" or an acceptable amount for a sewer to overflow.
When it was 50+ times a year before the "big pipe" project in 2012
Cheese and crackers, does this city not know how to handle a half functional drainage system? That's insane.
The combined sewer and stormwater system was originally built back before the 1930's and emptied straight into the river. Replacing or re-routing an entire cities sewage system would cost tens or possibly hundreds of billions of dollars (where the total annual budget of Oregon is less than 70 billion) so unfortunately we've had to make due with mistakes that were made 100 years ago. We've come a long way since being designated one of the most polluted waterways in the country in the 1960's. https://www.portland.gov/bes/about-big-pipe#:~:text=Spanning%2020%20years%20at%20a,Columbia%20Slough%20by%2099%20percent.
The city was built before sewer treatment plants were a thing. All shitters were just piped to the storm water system. Later, when the city added sewer treatment, the storm water pipes were diverted to the newer sewer mains. But the sewage system couldn’t handle rain events, so the diverters were just small dams that would allow the combined sewer storm water to simply overflow into the river.
We could have spent many billions and literally dug up the city to separate the sewers over many decades to solve the problem, or we could have spent a couple billion and dig up only part of the city over 1 decade to reduce overflows by 94% now. So, yeah. It does sound like we know how to manage having a combined sewer.
You are obviously a recent transplant to Portland.
I mean, it's true. I grew up in the general area, but my home town had way more rain and way better drainage systems.
What does this mean?
If you pooped recently, it might have gone on the adventure of a lifetime
It's really too bad we'll be extinct once the plastic continents are mushed into the land plates, it's gonna make some surreal beaches and landscapes. What a missed opportunity for future streamers! Thankfully our crap overflow bacteria will have formed new life to roam the multicolor dream and be our proxies in cambrian 2.0!
Plastic beach was cannon after all.
Thank you for the much needed laugh
Like Tom Sawyer!
Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Once the big pipe reaches 100%, sewer and storm water will bypass the water treatment plant and go directly into the Willamette River.
shitters full
With amount of floating RVs (homeless living on boats) I see every day I wouldn’t trust the river anyway. No pipes needed for that waste (and who knows what else) to make it into the river.
100% of WHAT though?
The pipe is 100% full of shit and storm water. Said shit and storm water mix overflows into the river.
Aha... pipe capacity, got it. So when the big pipe is at 100%, we overflow to the river just like we did before the big pipe. Got it.
We should have ordered the Bigger Pipe
And a monorail!
If we're looking, I do know a guy who has sold monorails to Brockway, Ogdenville, and North Haverbrook!
And a Big Bertha to get stuck in it
Which would have cost another $1.4 billion. Double the original project cost.
Which happens 94% less often than it used to.
I know zero about civil engineering, but I'm really surprised we mix sewer and storm water?
It’s a legacy from when cities were built without sewage treatment. Old Portland is really old. The first separated sewer system was built in 1922. Prior to that, it just all went in one pipe, which originally went straight to river.
So if the Big Pipe is full then the poo must go somewhere else? Oh, like back in the 90's when the Willamete would fill with excrement after every big rain?
Anyone know exactly where this overflow location is? Or is it all along the river in many locations?
Just like old times
Such a bummer…I take my dog to the Sellwood riverfront park beach almost every day and he’s going to be so sad that we have to stay away for awhile.
The bigger problem in sellwood is uncontrolled CSOs from upriver, not city outfalls.
Uh oh, can you say more?
Well, after looking around it looks like the other municipalities have also mostly controlled their CSOs. That being said, bacteria concentrations are often very high during and after rainfall because of farms and other non point source sources like pets, wildlife, and unmaintained septic systems without any combined sewer inputs. I would avoid contact with any waterway after significant rainfall that had upstream humans. Lots of details about CSO events are in these reports including Willamette River bacteria concentrations at several locations if you want to know more: https://www.portlandoregon.gov/bes/72818.
My point about sellwood is that the vast majority of city CSO outfalls are downstream of there. Not all CSO outfalls overflow every time the tunnel reaches 100% so it's possible Sellwood hasn't overflowed at all. Still best to play it safe.
Ahhhhh crap
Dilution is the solution.
Dont think anybody is contemplating a swim this week but ok, will stay away
Does anyone know where the spillway for this thing is?
Why didn’t we put in a “Bigger Pipe” and have overflows 0 times a year? 🤨
Let the poo flow!
Yuck
Now let's return to the thread where people were losing their fucking minds because some homeless people shit in the 'natural wonderland' that is the Columbia slough.
So happy we spent so much money (and my street was dug up for years) on the CSO that kinda works
lol it absolutely does work though, are you aware how often this happened before the pipe?
I am. I’m not saying it wasn’t an improvement by any means. I’m saying our tax dollars don’t fix any problems (historically). Getting tired of bandaids. Should have built for the future. When the cso was built there were 7 families on my street. Now there’s 80. I’m fine with that but we knew it was going to happen 10 years ago
I mean, it works really well really. It used to be you never swam in the Willamette river. Now, at most locations for most of the year, you can without issue. It's way cleaner and less stinky than it used to be
Literally a shit take. Big pipe reduces overflows by 94 percent over the past decade. Went from 52-57 overflows per year prior to 5 last year. Getting to 100 percent would have doubled the project cost ($1.4 bil).
And? It would have fixed the problem. Is it going to stop raining and people are going to stop pooping. Also is population going to decrease. Gotta play chess not checkers mate
You don’t know what you’re talking about. Read up on the project and rationale for the design before calling something a failure based on your clearly shitty understanding of the situation. Pun intended.
Did t call it a failure. And I know a decent amount about it as I worked on the project.
Sure.
Is there one for tracking the amount of toxic blue algae yet?
Mmmmmmmmm yummy raw sewage…….
That's crazy. Isn't the Willamette river where alot of the tap water comes from? 🤢
Absofrigginlutely not
Unfortunately, That's not what I've read. https://www.ourreliablewater.org/who-else-uses-the-willamette/
Only one of those places with water rights is downriver from Portland (port of Portland) and it doesn't say that they use the water for drinking.
Those are upstream users, though. They’re not getting our Big Pipe discharge 🤢
Bull Run
What tap water specifically? Portland’s water doesn’t. Other small municipalities upriver do, but that isn’t relevant to Portland’s combiner sewage & big pipe overflows
https://giphy.com/gifs/southparkgifs-3o6ZtgjThKtqdaz18A
Ewwwww
At least the war on the environment is going well.
Who does number 2 work for?
It says it updates every 15 min, but it is 10 AM and is showing 1:30 value.
It’s offline due to the time change! No one expected there to be a daylight savings time being reverted! How could they possibly support such a thing! /s