Georgia County to Build $312 Million Underground Tunnel

Georgia’s Cobb County is looking to an underground solution to meet anticipated wastewater treatment demands in the southwestern part of the county, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

On March 11, the county commissioners awarded contracts totaling $312 million to engineer and build a 5.5-mile tunnel that will drain about 40% of Cobb, an area south of Ga. 120 in West Cobb.

It will be the second tunnel for Cobb, which opened a 9.5-mile tunnel in East Cobb in 2004.

The South Cobb Tunnel, as it will be called, will average 250 ft in depth as it runs south through bedrock from near the boundary with Douglas County and then runs east to a treatment plant on the Chattahoochee River, the newspaper reported.

Building the tunnel will allow the county to avoid replacing two pumping stations and 16 miles of aging sewer lines, said Steve McCullers, director of the Cobb County Water System.

Work is slated to begin this summer and be completed in 2014.

"This is the largest project ever undertaken by the water system," McCullers said.

Source: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution