The Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati (MSD) provides wastewater collection and treatment for residents and corporations in Hamilton County, Ohio. MSD was formed in 1968 and continues to be responsible for the management and operation of the sewer district as well as manage the regulations and improvement programs for the city.
As part of a federally mandated water quality project along the Kings Run Stream and Mill Creek, the MSD identified a need for expansion along Winton Road. The Kings Run watershed is about 1,000 acres in size and includes portions of the Cincinnati neighborhoods of College Hill, Spring Grove Village and Winton Hills. The watershed was named after the Kings Run stream, which used to flow into the Mill Creek.
The MSD proposed a new combined sewer overflow (CSO) system to be installed in the area to handle the increased population in the area and allow for the restoration project of the associated bodies of water. Originally, a concrete vault was included in the early phases of design and scoping. Contech Engineered Solutions worked with the project engineer to identify an alternative solution that was more cost-effective yet allowed for the deep installation and flexible configuration that was required within the site design.
The CSO project began in 2017 and was completed in 2019. The goals were to reduce combined sewer overflows that would discharge into the two water bodies, restore Kings Run as a tributary to Mill Creek and improve water quality in both streams. It was estimated that the overall project would eliminate 98 million gallons of overflow in Mill Creek each year.
The Kings Run Improvement Project was divided into 5 phases of constructing new stormwater detention basins, new storm and sanitary sewers, relocation of combined sewers, and a 0.67-million-gallon underground storage system (Phase B - designated CSO 217).
Working with Power Engineers, Contech manufactured a watertight CSO system using DuroMaxx® Steel Reinforced Polyethylene (SRPE) pipe system with welded coupler (WC) joints as an option for the CSO 217 project.
During heavy storm events, approximately 274,000 GPD of overflow discharges at CSO 217 Kings Run Stream. Overflows from Kings Run were recaptured into the combined sewer system and contribute to the overflows at CSO 483 into Mill Creek. This improvement to the area would restore the historic connection between the two water bodies. The MSD was able to complete the enhancements to the watershed area and overflow now discharges into the large, combined sewer that collects sanitary sewage and stormwater from the watershed while any additional overflow is capture in the DuroMaxx® CSO storage tank.
CSO tanks are critical to the design, helping to detain the heavy rain events and allow for the stream stabilization measures downstream to work as intended. Both the MSD and the project engineers were pleased with the DuroMaxx® CSO tank solution as it provided the necessary storage while addressing the site constraints and structural capacity requirements, economically.
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