By WMBD TV
BLOOMINGTON, Ill. (WMBD) — The Bloomington-Normal Water Reclamation District is receiving a $5 million grant from the state to help fund sewer infrastructure upgrades.
The grant will help fund a Three Phase Project which will install about six and a half miles worth of sewer pipes, stretching from the BNWRD campus in West Bloomington to about College Avenue in Normal. It will increase the amount of raw sewage the facility is able to take to about 20 million gallons per day.
“Essentially, what this does is on the west side of Bloomington and Normal, it’s going to add a large sewer that can convey up to almost 20 million gallons of additional sewage per day to this facility. So essentially, what we’re doing is we’re increasing our capacity to bring sewage from out in the community to this facility,” said Timothy Ervin, executive director of the BNWRD.
Ervin hopes that with the grant money, the $7.5 million project will allow for more development in the Twin Cities, whether that be commercial, industrial or residential.
“This is one of the largest underground projects we’ve had for 20 years, where we are actually constructing a new underground sewer that’s going to serve Bloomington and Normal. But also, it’s one of three phases where we’re eventually going to construct the sewer up to north Normal to even support more growth within the community,” Ervin said.
This is the first time the sewers in the Twin Cities are being updated in nearly a century.
This story was originally reported by WMBD-TV and published on CIProud.com.
