Chedoke Creek Spill Update

Hello Ward 8 Neighbours,

As you are aware, an undetected flow of combined stormwater and sewage was spilled into Chedoke Creek due to a partially open overflow gate at the King Street West Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) Tank from January 28, 2014 to July 18, 2018.

The following was originally published on January 14, 2020. Updates to the original post have been added.

For more details, please continue reading below…

What is Combined Sewer Overflow? What is a Plant Bypass?

Wastewater treatment bypass or combined sewer overflow (CSO) can occur in various ways:

• Volume of storm water (rain and melting snow/ice) and wastewater exceeds the capacity of the sewer system, CSO storage tank or the wastewater treatment plants
• When elevated lake levels cause lake water to back-feed into the wastewater collection system
• Facilitate vital maintenance repairs at the treatment plant or at CSO plants

Wastewater Treatment Plant Operations staff monitor incoming flows and system/plant levels and make operational adjustments to the treatment processes as required.

Operations staff can initiate a bypass or CSO tank overflow event when the system is full to protect the system from infrastructure damage and to prevent basement and/or surface flooding.

The City of Hamilton has a complex network of systems involving various types of wastewater collection. Some networks are separated, others involve combined sewer systems. Separated systems are usually found in newer areas of the city, where as the older areas have combined systems, meaning that they are collecting household waste as well as rain/melt water.

Bypasses and CSO events are necessary to ensure that basements do not flood, as well as  to prevent surface flooding of roads and causing damage to Wastewater Treatment Plants.

To find out more about the city’s real-time monitoring page, click here.

Update – February 14, 2020

Upper Chedoke Creek is buried underground in #Ward8Hamilton. We’ve made so much progress improving water quality across #HamOnt but our next steps must consider the entire watershed with policy that fixes root problems. Learn what happened in Chedoke here: https://t.co/VijgH14TEf

— John-Paul Danko (@JohnPaulDanko) February 13, 2020

The City of Hamilton has released the following video. Please watch below to learn what happened in Chedoke Creek.

The City of Hamilton has also received a new report on ecological risk assessment SLR Consulting. They indicated that they would “anticipate recontamination of that site until (other pollution) inputs are managed” and argued that dredging out polluted sludge is “unnecessary,” potentially damaging to wildlife and likely futile, given how often storms force sewage and other toxic run-off out of old city sewers and into Chedoke Creek.

Councillor Danko had the following thoughts to hearing that news:

#HamOnt needs to reduce & delay upstream flows before they overflow CSO tanks & contaminate our waterways🌊 One policy solution is a monetary price on the service of stormwater management – fair stable funding for infrastructure, paid in proportion to impervious surfaces. https://t.co/AuCk1cXwD6

— John-Paul Danko (@JohnPaulDanko) February 13, 2020

The City of Hamilton issued the following update via news release on February 14, 2020.

We will continue to update residents of Ward 8 of any new news, initiatives or findings.

Questions or concerns?

If you have any questions or concerns, you can contact our office here.