After completion of next step, Sarasota city manager says, aboveground work will begin
McKim & Creed has completed two-thirds of the below-ground work on Lift Station 87 in Luke Wood Park near downtown Sarasota, City Manager Tom Barwin announced in his June 14 newsletter
Providing a photo with his comments, Barwin wrote, “Take a look below at the amazing progress made on the Lift Station 87 project, a massive undertaking that will improve our wastewater system and provide more reliable service for our customers over the next century. This structure sits about 50 feet underground and will handle approximately one-third of the City’s wastewater flow when complete.”
After one further, Barwin continued, the “wetwell” will be at grade.
The wetwell is the area of a lift station that receives the wastewater, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
He added that “progress should accelerate over the next several months as above-ground construction begins on the building that will house all of the lift station’s electrical components and controls, well above any threat for a storm surge or related flood.”
The facility has been planned to withstand a Category 3 hurricane, the project website explains.
Additionally, Barwin wrote, “We appreciate the continued patience of nearby residents affected by the construction.”
Along with the installation of new sewer lines, the website points out, the project also will entail the replacement of aging water lines “to improve water pressure,” installation of new pipelines to carry reclaimed water “to provide the area with an environmentally friendly source of irrigation water,” and the repurposing and landscaping of Lift Station 7 — which Lift Station 87 will supplant — as a neighborhood park, after Lift Station 7 has been decommissioned.
Lift Station 7 is near the end of its useful life, the project website explains. Because of that fact and the history of failures of that facility, the City Commission approved the construction of Lift Station 87.
Members of the public may remain updated on the project through community meetings hosted by the project team, visits with Utilities Department staff at the project construction office (824 Osprey Ave.), calls to the project information line (356-8071) and via the project website, LiftStation87.com, he noted.