A tour of Atlanta’s South River Sewer Tunnel
Photos of the $111 million project that will keep raw sewage for pouring out into the streets
Elected officials descended into the bowels of hell today to tour the South River Sewer Tunnel, the last major project of Atlanta’s $4 billion court-ordered sewer overhaul.
For more than a year, work crews have dug two 170-feet-deep shafts at the construction site near the South River Water Reclamation Plant in southeast Atlanta. Now, with the assistance of a multi-million dollar “tunnel boring machine,” workers will drill day and night through approximately 9,000 feet of bedrock. Atlanta City Councilwoman Carla Smith, who chairs the Council’s utilities committee, said the tunnel route is ideal because the bedrock is soft enough to drill, but solid enough not to crumble. Once complete in July 2011, the 14-foot-wide tunnel will connect the plant to Macon Drive near South River Bridge.
As the machine chisels into the granite, rock is collected and travels hundreds of feet via several conveyer belts back to the shaft. Although it’s currently a craggy and muddy work site, engineers say the $111 million project will be lined with a foot of concrete. Pumps will be constructed in one of the shafts; the other will be covered to prevent people from plunging to their demise. And if rains overwhelm the city’s sewers, the tunnel will become a massive depository of sewage and rainwater.